The Grand Lake Theatre, My Hometown Movie Palace, Is Turning 100

Oakland’s Grand Lake Theatre, the movie palace just northeast of Lake Merritt, celebrates its 100th birthday this week.

As far as I can remember, the theater has been a château for characters and a setting for stories. I’m not talking about characters and stories in the films, but the place itself. It’s a palace for the people.

First opening its doors on March 6, 1926, the Grand Lake started out presenting vaudeville shows and silent black-and-white films, but soon gained color and sound. Now, years later, it thrives in a world of 3D movies and high-tech projectors. But the theater, which Variety recently named one of the coolest theaters in the world, isn’t just about movies. Not hardly. It’s about the people who gather there to share laughs, shed tears, spill snacks and have life-changing experiences inside its art deco-style walls.

At any birthday party marking a milestone age, someone gets up to give a speech. I have a deep history with the Grand Lake, and now, as it turns 100, allow me to raise my bag of popcorn and give you mine.

Last spring, I hosted a discussion at the Grand Lake after the local premiere of Sinners. On stage, actor Delroy Lindo discussed his time as a student at San Francisco’s ACT, where he studied alongside Denzel Washington. Musician Raphael Saadiq shed light on Oakland’s influence on his music, ultimately leading him to compose the Grammy Award-winning centerpiece of the film. Director Ryan Coogler reflected on the discipline and structure he learned by playing Pee Wee football in the East Bay, and the foundation it laid for the Oscar-nominated moviemaker.

When I introduced myself to the packed audience, I admitted that as a kid, I once ran out of that very theater, scared of the dinosaurs in the 1993 film Jurassic Park.

My history doesn’t go as far back as its current owner, Allen Michaan, who acquired the lease in 1980 and bought the building outright in 2018. The first movie I saw there was 1991’s The Rocketeer.

My aunt Denise took me to the Grand Lake to see Toy Story in 1995, and my sister Erikka took me to see 1998’s Rush Hour. In 2014, I recall watching Selma with my mother – one of the few times I’ve seen her cry.

Speaking of tears, there’s been plenty of them shed in that theater. In 2013, at the premiere of Ryan Coogler’s Fruitvale Station, I sat a few rows behind Oscar Grant III’s family. The weeping was audible.

I’ll embarrassingly admit that I also cried while watching the 1996 film Fly Away Home — the scene where the goose got caught in the propeller hit me in the heart.

Another embarrassing moment came when a friend and I got kicked out of 1995’s The Brady Bunch Movie. As bored knuckleheads, we learned the hard way that movie theaters aren’t the place to play hide-and-seek. And while we’re at it, I’ll add that the theater also hosted one of my worst date nights. I should’ve known going to see the 2001 film Shallow Hal wasn’t a wise move.

In contrast, as a graduate student at UC Berkeley’s School of Journalism in 2013, I wrote about Jordan Thierry’s documentary, The Black Fatherhood Project. I attended the screening on a first date with a beautiful woman. Thirteen years later, we’re raising an amazing child together.

My thesis film from that UC Berkeley graduate program, a documentary titled TDK: The Dream Kontinues, was shown at the 2015 Oakland International Film Festival. If ever there was a “I made it” moment, watching my own work up on the Grand Lake Theatre’s screen was one of them.

In 2019, I hosted a discussion with the cast from The Last Black Man in San Francisco, and in 2021 I talked with filmmaker Pete Nicks after a screening of his documentary Homeroom — both significant contributions to local film.

I’ve also seen the Grand Lake’s neighborhood change. Across the intersection, the building once known as Lakeview Elementary School was eventually converted to Oakland Unified School District’s Student Assignment Center. The greasy-yet-delicious Kwik Way fast-food joint down the block turned into to a vegan restaurant before it shuttered a few years ago. The park across the street got remodeled, and the farmer’s market there on Saturdays is now a community staple.

Even the streets themselves have been drastically altered. When the theater broke ground, the Key System’s trollies ran up and down the surrounding avenues. Meanwhile, last year, the intersection out front hosted a sideshow.

The building has seen renovations and expansions; it started as a single theater, and expanded to four screens. The refurbished sign atop the building is part of the Lake Merritt skyline, and the marquee is essentially a community member itself, voicing the political messages of theater owner Allen Michaan and echoing sentiments shared by many in the Bay Area.

While there have been other theaters with deep community impact and memories, many of them are now defunct: the Century 8, the Coliseum Drive-in and the old United Artists Emery Bay theater, to name just a few.

And while some classic East Bay movie houses are still in operation, like the Jack London Cinema and Landmark Piedmont Theatre, there’s something undeniably unique about the Grand Lake Theatre, with its Mighty Wurlitzer Organ, reasonably priced snacks and location smack dab in the middle of the Town. Parking isn’t the easiest, and the chairs can get uncomfortable if you’re watching a long film like Titanic. But it’s my home theater.

I’ve not only created history there, I’ve repeated history, too: I took my daughter to the Grand Lake to see Toy Story 4 (2019), passing along the Pixar baton from my childhood. Sure enough, when those creepy dolls showed up on the screen, she too ran out of the theater like I did when I saw the T-Rex in Jurassic Park.

In addition to seeing Sinners with the makers of the film last year, I also attended a screening of Undefeated: The Wrongful Conviction of Pierre Rushing (2025), as well as the first Bay Area Film Night, an evening dedicated to work by local filmmakers.

Those three experiences exemplify what Grand Lake Theatre is all about. A blockbuster, star-studded event with Draymond Green and Steph Curry in the audience. A documentary advocating for a person wrongfully put behind bars. And a set of films comedically telling stories of love and romance from the perspective of up-and-coming filmmakers.

Although the subject matter in the three films differed drastically, the driving force behind every ticket sold was the same: the audience.

While the Grand Lake Theatre is a century-old building made for showing films, it’s the people who make the stories there.

The Grand Lake Theatre (3200 Grand Ave., Oakland) hosts free screenings of ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ ‘Singin’ in the Rain,’ ‘Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs’ and ‘Fantasia’ all day on Wednesday, March 4, to celebrate its 100th birthday. First come, first served. More details on screenings and tours of the theater here.