American Conservatory Theater Strand Theater

The Strand Theater began its life in nineteen seventeen as the Jewel, a building designed exclusively for silent films. While most theaters of that era were built as combination houses that also hosted vaudeville acts, the Jewel stood out by committing entirely to the new medium of cinema. Over the decades, it cycled through several names, including the Sun, the College, and the Francesca, before finally becoming the Strand. By the late twentieth century, the building had fallen into disrepair, eventually serving as a venue for adult films and becoming a vacant, boarded-up eyesore until the American Conservatory Theater initiated a major rescue of the structure in twenty twelve.