The SF venue where the Dead were kings and Bob Dylan was booed

San Francisco’s Mid-Market District is a microcosm of the city’s history, a main artery for commerce and transit that has seen great highs and deep lows, from the bustling 1920s, which saw expanded development of Market into “one of the great streets in the world,” to divestment and demolishing in the 1960s, and tech-led gentrification in the 2010s and beyond. Among the buildings that have seen it all — and ridden the changing tides — is the Warfield.

While now operated by Goldenvoice/AEG and host to rock, metal and alternative acts, the Warfield’s 104-year-old history touches nearly every genre of music. If it was popular in San Francisco, it probably graced the Warfield’s stage at least once (or, in the case of the Grateful Dead, 15 times in 19 days).

While the Warfield doesn’t host many local or upstart bands, it remains an important place for touring rock and rock-adjacent groups (not to mention the litany of rap and electronic acts on the venue’s calendar). It’s also one of few venues of its size in the city, with a max capacity of 2,454 — a sweet spot for some acts and bookers. Its closest competitor is the Fox Theater in Oakland, which can hold up to 2,800 people and is operated by Another Planet Entertainment.

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FILE: A view up the double stairwell at the Warfield in San Francisco.

FILE: The Ramones perform in concert April 12, 1980, at the Warfield Theater in San Francisco.

As with most major cities, San Francisco has long loved stage and screen. For decades, the city’s movie theater district was concentrated along Market Street between Mason and Polk streets, anchored by studio-run chains like the Fox, Paramount, Embassy and Strand. The district included several live‐production theaters that, together, attracted people from throughout the Bay Area.

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“Theater venues like the Warfield were tied to thriving, diverse cities like San Francisco, where, importantly, residents had access to cheap public transportation,” said Felicia Angeja Viator, an associate professor of history at San Francisco State University. “They were spaces for free expression, cheap enough for working-class folks and as popular as amusement parks.”

The Warfield opened on May 13, 1922, as Loew’s Warfield — a “grand dame of a theatre” dedicated to film and vaudeville with a capacity of over 2,650 and a 33-foot-deep stage. The venue was the 300th theater commissioned by Marcus Loew and the 26th opened by his company within 18 months. The Warfield was built by local architect Gustave Albert Lansburgh; the early ’20s were a boom time for Lansburgh, who simultaneously designed the neighboring Golden Gate Theatre (which also opened in 1922).

FILE: Carlos Santana performing at the Warfield Theater in San Francisco, on Nov. 17, 1979.

FILE: People line up outside the Warfield Theater in San Francisco, waiting to get into the movie “Red Danube.”

Loew’s new theater featured a marbled lobby with gilding and chandeliers, a grand staircase and, in the theater itself, a “lyrical mural … of floating matadors and their senoritas, as well as the dismembered head of their animal victim,” per the Warfield’s website. Loew seemed to spare little expense, hiring lauded muralist Albert Herter to paint the theater’s proscenium arch.

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The San Francisco Chronicle lavished praise upon the new theater in its issue on May 7, 1922, spilling much ink about the design. “One is struck on entering the Warfield by its width and the symphony of tones in which it is decorated,” writer George C. Warren opined. “… The mural decoration carries out the general design of the house — that of a fan. From the painting spreading panels extend to the walls, narrow where they join the mural; and widening as their rays reach out, each ending in a sunken circle which will be lighted and in each of which there is a sunburst in metallic colors.”

A theater of such grandeur demanded a weighty name. Though it was originally set to be called Loew’s State, Loew decided to name the space for his friend David Warfield, an SF native who began his career as an usher and who grew to become a renowned stage actor — one of the

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