MEYER There were more gay-themed films shown at the Presidio than any other public screenings. Just by showing Warhol and Kenneth Anger and Jack Smith regularly that was the case. Straight sex also sold very well; the appeal of camp had grown to be of interest to all audiences. They were selling a clever combination of sex and laughs, and promising to be outrageous beyond our previous experience. Pure showmanship. The Gate (where Edith Kramer may have programmed the films) didn’t promote the shows as cleverly, but we attended on blind faith that we’d see something wild -- as often in the audience as on screen. And, as 16-year-olds, we’d also get a few swigs of Red Mountain as the jugs were freely passed around.
KAREN LARSEN Gosh, I remember going to see the Cockettes at the Palace in North Beach in the ’60s. And I remember going to a theater in Chinatown that was 99 cents and showed midnight movies.
JAMES T. HARRIS (in the Village Voice) The lobby of the Palace Theatre was a beautiful place to be gay.
MICHAEL WEISE (from "25 Great Reasons to Stay Up Late," by Jennifer M. Wood in MovieMaker): "[In 1968 Steven Arnold and I] were able to book the Palace Theater. At the premiere [of Arnold and Weise's Messages, Messages], 2,000 people showed up for a 20-minute, black-and-white film with no dialogue.... That was the real genesis of midnight movies."

Photo of Steven Arnold (from www.stevenarnold.net)

PAM TENT (from Midnight at the Palace: My Life as a Fabulous Cockette (Alyson)) Artist and filmmaker Steven Arnold played a major role in shaking the dust off a venerable Chinese movie palace.
One of the original New Age luminaries to electrify the SF art scene, Steven started his career while still in high school. Illustrating posters for film critic Pauline Kael at the Cinema Guild Studio in Berkeley, he amassed a vast knowledge of film. [Steven and his partner Michael Weise’s] first production was a short film entitled The Liberation of the Mannique Mechanique, followed the next year by another called The Elements. In 1969 -- after filming Messages, Messages -- Steven approached Mr. Chew, a local businessman and owner of the Palace Theatre, with the intention of renting an appropriate space for a one-night showing of the film to his friends. In the audience that night were future Cockettes John Rothermel and Frank (Inez) Bourquin…Mr. Chew was impressed by the size of the invitation-only crowd, and a deal was struck for continuing the midnight events…
For all its allure, there was an underlying funkiness that gave the Palace its unique flavor. As there was no intermission between the kung-fu flicks and the onslaught of the midnight crowd, there was no opportunity for the staff to clean the floors. Rhinestone divas in stiletto heels and hybrid hippies in glittered sneakers crunched through the paper cups, cigarette butts, and sticky candy wrappers that littered the floor like fallen leaves...
The midnight movies at the Palace were soon called the Nocturnal Dream Shows.

Photo by Steven Arnold (from www.stevenarnold.net)

REX REED (from “The Cockettes, “ in People Are Crazy Here (out of print)) “This is where it’s at,” said Truman Capote when he went to see the Cockettes, and he said a mouthful…they perform Friday nights at midnight between Dick Tracy serials, porno flicks and revivals of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in a Chinese grind house called the Palace, in SF’s seedy North Beach…
It was a Friday night at midnight and in the streets bewildered police tried to control 2,000 screaming, romping, bumping, grinding, flaunting, swishing, writhing and staggering fans…nobody paid any attention to the SOLD OUT signs. They broke down the exit doors and 300 more friends of the Cockettes stormed in free…an enormous blond in tomato-red satin hot pants with biceps and a hairy chest held hands with an Indian maharishi carrying a Sun-Ra poster. “This is the only true theater,” observed Capote, “where there is total participation from an audience that is part of the show itself.”
J. HOBERMAN AND JONATHAN ROSENBAUM (from Midnight Movies (Da Capo): "Despite, or perhaps because of, the film's antihippie gibes, the city in which [Multiple Maniacs] enjoyed its greatest success was SF. Throughout the first half of 1971, it was the weekend midnight feature at the Palace, a movie house whose main attraction was the stage show performed by the Cockettes.... Divine was invited out for an appearance that April, and [John] Waters conducted a special live show. Introduced as ‘the most beautiful woman in the world,’ Divine sashayed out on the Palace stage in Multiple Maniacs costume, pushing a shopping cart filled with dead mackerels. In between 'glamour fits,' she heaved the fish into the audience, strobe-lit by the continual detonation of flash bulbs."

Still from Multiple Maniacs

MEYER Working for United Artists Theaters in 1972, I began a circuit of midnight series from Berkeley to Merced, Chico to Susanville, Reno to Seattle. The film rental might be $50-100 for a double or triple feature. The manager made a commission on the profit margin and the concessions -- and you can bet the audience had the munchies.
In the fall of 1975 I booked The Rocky Horror Picture Show into the Metro II (little sister down the street from big Metro) for a regular engagement. It bombed, as it did everywhere, and Fox took it out of release. [When it began a second life as a midnight movie] the Powell Theater at the cable car turnaround) started showing it, building a small cult following.
On April 1, 1976 we took over the U.C. Theatre. As soon as Fox could get us a print of Rocky Horror we were off and running, playing it at least 2 midnights every week. A series of live fantastic casts elevated the experience. Rocky Horror at the UC Theatre was the longest running continuous engagement of any movie in the world, ending after around 22 years. We played it throughout the Landmark circuit and there were many months where it paid the bills, grossing more that an entire week of our regular programming.

"In heaven, everything is fine": Eraserhead

PETER MOORE We [the Roxie Cinema] were approached by Ben Barenholtz with Eraserhead in 1977 and showed it for years. Early in the run we brought David Lynch out, and I remember having lunch in a Tenderloin diner that completely charmed David. We also showed Pink Flamingos, The Honeymoon Killers, and Thundercrack! (of course). And we showed Forbidden Zone, but that was a case of trying too hard for cultness.
ROXIE CINEMA CALENDAR, APRIL 1977 "Midnite Friday: Curt McDowell's Thundercrack! Midnite Saturday: Divine in Mondo Trasho."
ANITA MONGA Curt McDowell, the talented and charming underground (as we called them in those days) filmmaker, was a student of George Kuchar at the [SF] Art Institute, then his lover and collaborator on many films, including the infamous midnight favorite Thundercrack! Curt's films were moving, confessional, ribald, and often absurd, with brilliant sound and picture, art direction, and original music on the teeniest of threadbare budgets. He was inventive to the bone.

Thundercrack!

KUCHAR (from Reflections From a Cinematic Cesspool (Zanja)) Young people in this City by the Bay were aiming their movie cameras at exposed chakras left and right...One quiet youth used to screen his super 8mm movies in my morning class. We'd all munch on croissants and sip coffee while we watched his latest epic on how to play with your pecker in 101 ways.
HOBERMAN AND ROSENBAUM (in Midnight Movies) "At the Strand in SF — where the performance group Double Feature would mime virtually the entire [Rocky Horror Picture Show] — pickaxes were brandished in the audience when Frank took after Eddie with one."
MARCUS HU I remember going with a bunch of high school classmates to the Strand Theatre in 1979 and seeing The Rocky Horror Picture Show and being completely mesmerized by the religious experience of being in a packed theater that was singing and performing in sync with the silver screen. It must have made an indelible mark on me, as I went to work for Mike Thomas, who ran the theater, and that pretty much defined my life!

Poster for The Rocky Horror Picture Show

MOORE Paul Bartel invited me to a work-in-progress screening of Eating Raoul around 1980- or 1981, 'cause he wanted to know my opinion on the midnight prospects for it. The screening was in Berkeley at the PFA and my car caught on fire on 80. I abandoned it at the foot of University Avenue and caught a cab. I loved the movie but I explained that if it was incredibly successful it could play a year. Which would mean 52 showings. Which was like two weeks in a theatre. He got my point and opened the film on a regular theatrical engagement.
MARC HUESTIS Marc Huestis's Whatever Happened to Susan Jane premiered at midnight on Feb. 13, 1982, at the Castro Theatre to a wild, sold-out house replete with the crème de la crème of San Francisco's ’80s new wave scene. Mel Novikoff, president of the Surf Theatre chain, gave Huestis a good deal on a fourwall as the fledgling director pushed popcorn at one of his theaters. However, legend says he was heard running out of Susan Jane screaming, "They'll go see this garbage, but they won't come see the Truffaut at the Clay!"
ROXIE CINEMA CALENDAR, AUG.–<\D>SEPT. 1982 "Saturday at midnight! Basket Case!"

Poor lil' murderous Bilal from Basket Case

SUSAN GERHARD I remember screenings of Todd Haynes's amazing Superstar: The Karen Carpenter Story at the Castro right when I first moved to SF, around 1988.
HOBERMAN AND ROSENBAUM (in Midnight Movies) “[Otto Preminger's] Skidoo ... has slowly but surely been gaining a second life as a midnight feature — particularly in the SF Bay area, where the movie is set."
ROXIE CINEMA CALENDAR, JULY–<\D>AUG., 1990 "Saturday midnights ... Frank Henenlotter's latest and possibly greatest grim sex and gore comedy, Frankenhooker!"
WILL "THE THRILL" VIHARO Thrillville began as a midnight series called the Midnight Lounge in April 1997 before switching to prime time — 9:15 p.m. — on Thursdays in January 1999. Around the same time the Werepad shared its vast film library with the public weekly — not at midnight, but they were definitely midnight movies.
PEACHES CHRIST The first Midnight Mass, featuring Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!, took place on May 30, 1998.
JESSE HAWTHORNE FICKS Midnites for Maniacs began at the Four Star on Aug. 2, 2003. The slumber party all-night triple feature — with free cereal at 4 a.m. — featured Revenge of the Cheerleaders, Pinball Summer, and Joysticks. The first Midnites for Maniacs event at the Castro took place on Jan. 27, 2006; it was a disco roller-skating triple feature: Roller Boogie, Xanadu, and Skatetown, USA. (Johnny Ray Huston)