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Business & Tech

The Bal: 65 Years of Trying to Turn a Profit

Since the dawn of the multiplex, a half-dozen owners have struggled, and failed, to make the single-screen theater a profitable business venture that's acceptable to city officials.

The Bal Theatre has had a rocky existence since it opened its doors 65 years ago.

It was unveiled on July 1, 1946, a glamorous movie house that cost $250,000 to build and showed newly released feature films starring the likes of Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart.

Hollywood stars appeared on opening night, imprinting their hands and feet into the front sidewalk as an airplane dropped streamers and confetti from the sky and searchlights lit up the night, according to an article from that time in the now-defunct San Leandro News Observer.

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The story described the Bal as “featuring the most modern sound equipment and the latest in theater comfort,” including rare and exotic carpeting.

The theater was constructed by Beckett and Federighi for Renny LaMarre and George Drummond, well-known East Bay businessmen at the time. The pair owned a large recording company in Oakland; LaMarre was a former Fox executive who once handled publicity for celebrities such as Will Rogers and Shirley Temple.

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LaMarre, himself a musician, built a stage at the Bal with the intention of using it to screen live musical acts, including artists at his recording company, according to Dan Dillman, the current owner of the venue.

The Observer wrote:

Under their joint ownership, the Bal will feature top screen attractions for residents of the San Leandro, Ashland, San Lorenzo and Hayward area. As San Leandro’s third and newest theater, the Bal will provide screen entertainment for the hundreds of new families who moved into the residential area that grew so rapidly during the war.

The theater was meant to provide recreation to shoppers at the adjoining retail centers, which were also built by developers who constructed the Bal.

But that all changed in the 1960s, when showing first-run films became economically unfeasible.

According to the website CinemaTour.com, in 1962 LaMarre won an $800,000 settlement from an antitrust lawsuit he filed against the United California Theater Company, a theater chain that enjoyed a monopoly over the movie industry, and supplied films to the Bal only after screening them first at its own theaters. He also won the right to renew showing first-run films.

The Bal v. Multiplexes, VHS

Still, LaMarre had trouble competing with theaters in Oakland and San Francisco, and soon sold the Bal to United Artists Theatres, according to CinemaTour. The company didn't do much better, fighting to survive as a single-screen theater at a time when multiplexes were popping up all over the country.

United Artists, in turn, sold the Bal to Hayward-based Republic Theater Company, which was run by Ralph Martin and his son, Lawrence. The Martin family began running the theater in 1972 and leased the space to a manager who showed Spanish-language films and hosted occasional live musical acts for nearly two decades.

The theater closed around 1993, purportedly because fewer good Spanish-language films were available, given the burgeoning VHS industry.

In an article dated Aug. 21, 1993, Martin told the San Leandro Times that despite his hard work, “It was lucky if the theater broke even.”

The article went on:

In an attempt to improve the theater’s patronage last year, ‘Bram Stoker’s Dracula,’ ‘Nowhere to Run,’ and ‘Gladiators’ — all American films — were shown with Spanish subtitles. ‘The turnout was terrible, certainly not enough to sustain the theater,’ said Martin.

The Martins contemplated various solutions, from lowering ticket prices to asking the city to purchase the theater for historical or public use, the Times reported. Ultimately, the family ended up leasing the theater to a Hindi movie company, which reopened the Bal in May 1997 to screen Indian films.

That venture lasted a little more than a year, and the theater again closed in late 1998.

Live Shows Create a Stir

The Bal opened again two years later, in August, 2000, under the management of Brady Ferguson. Ferguson refurbished the theater, which was then more than 50 years old.

He started staging midnight viewings of the 1975 Rocky Horror Picture Show, the mock gore film that often sparks audience participation. That move ultimately led to Ferguson's downfall.

Police raided one of the shows, which allegedly featured underage drinking, nudity (a girl lifted up her shirt onstage) and a raucous party afterward. The city revoked Ferguson's license in April 2001.

The Bal transferred hands again later that year, under a rent-to-own deal Martin struck with Bishop Teman Bostic of Fremont-based World Picture Plays Productions, a part of the Word Power and Praise Apostolic Church. Bostic renamed the theater the "Bringing About Love" or BAL Theatre, turning its original name into an acronym.

He operated the theater for three years before moving on because of his own controversies with the city regarding live shows.

According to news reports at the time, officials unexpectedly shut down a youth hip-hop talent show at the Bal in May, 2003, even though Bostic had previously hosted several similar shows without interference from the city.

In a letter, city officials told Bostic that his permit only allowed him to screen movies because the theater did not meet building standards at the time and had no on-site parking and that live shows could open the city up to potential liability.

Bostic wrote the city several times seeking permission to use the space for shows, seminars and biblical instruction (though not sermons) in addition to second-run movies. But he was told he would first have to provide a resolution to the building code and parking issues.

Bostic’s attorney, Timothy Tosta, told The Daily Review in a May 13, 2003 article that the bishop was only trying to create a venue where his congregation and others could go for quality, family-oriented entertainment — unlike the antics that occurred under the party-throwing Ferguson — and should be given a shot to try and make it work.  

"‘The problem with old theaters is how to make any use of them — they're vast spaces with lots of issues and not usable in a modern context if you have to bring them up to modern codes.... We have to be liberal in [our] outlook on what the building can do or it won't be useful,’” Tosta told the Review.

Later that year Robert J. Ernst, an attorney for sisters Lillian and Sally Martin — who by now had taken over ownership after the death of Ralph Martin — criticized the city for being overly restrictive, writing in an open letter that the theater had been visited by the city's health, safety and fire inspectors and had no violations.

Ernst also cited the financial difficulties of film screening for all but the multiplexes, and said the Bal had been used for live performances and assemblies before the city decided only movies could be shown there.

The city refuted the claim, and said neither live events nor religious assemblies could be grandfathered in to Bostic's use permit.

In the end, Bostic, who is black, accused city officials and local police of bigotry and prejudice in a heated four-page letter sent to media and civil rights leaders. He abandoned the theater.

After that fiasco, Shiraz Jivani reopened the theater, in November 2004, as part of his Naz8 Bollywood theater chain. At the time, Jivani was also screening Hindi moves at his popular multiplex in Fremont.

But a month into his debut in San Leandro, Jivani told The Daily Review he was worried about his business prospects at the Bal, given its single screen and lack of parking.

(In a possible vindication of Bostic’s claim about previous live performances, the Dec. 27, 2004, article quotes a man who said he used to attend live performances at the Bal. The man, Singh Baldev, who owned a liquor store located across the street from the theater at the time, told the Review that a previous Bal manager had hosted live classical Indian music and magicians.)

Jivani’s misgivings proved correct, as the theater again failed to draw enough of an audience to be profitable, and he left shortly thereafter. It was the second attempt at screening Indian films in a town without a single Indian restaurant.

The Martins begrudgingly took back management of the Bal in 2005, their last single-screen theater holding, and screened occasional movies.

Finally, Jeff and Dolores "Dee" Kerry, who own the property adjacent to the theater, on the corner of 148th Avenue, offered to buy the Bal to tear it down and replace it with retail stores. The Martins turned the offer down, and the city indicated it wished for the building to be used for its original purpose, according to Dillman.

Dillman, who had inquired about the Bal several times before, negotiated a sale with the Martins, promising he would restore the theater.

Now Dillman, like Bostic before him, said he feels like he's paying for the mistakes of Ferguson, the man behind the Rocky Horror Picture Show debacle. He says he wants to repair the bad blood that's existed in recent years between the city and the theater.

But to pay the bills, Dillman said, he can't rely on showing films alone. He is prohibited from playing first-run movies because Cinemark's Century 16 movie theater at Bayfair Mall has first rights, and the Bal is located too close. (Century 16 opened in the fall of 2000 after local officials put in years of time and effort to make the cinema a reality).

Plus, he maintains that live performances have always been a part of the theater, going back to its inception. Even Ralph Martin's son, Jim Martin, used to rehearse and play at the Bal with his popular band Faith No More, Dillman said.

Now, he says he wants to see the Bal Theatre become the kind of place that attracts not just locals, but also tourists from a wider area. This would help property values rise, neighboring businesses thrive and crime levels drop, he says.

"I really want to be a blessing for this town," Dillman said.

Read the third and final (for now, anyway) chapter of the Bal saga tomorrow on Patch. 

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