Napa Billiards sticking around, Gay film in Vallejo

Just two local gay news quickies since I have to head in to work early today:

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  Napa Billiards' owner is having second thoughts about selling and has decided to put his energy into keeping the place and making some positive changes. Yes, that probably means the rainbow flags are going back up and possibly a gay night. More info as we get it. Also, I'll be sure to find out what suggestions you all might have for the Billiards as their makeover gets underway.
  
  To celebrate their stay and Mexican Independence Day, there will be another upcoming drag show on Saturday, September 13th. It will for sure include the usual interesting mix of people, with a fight on TV earlier in the evening sure to draw more of the straight (and DL) crowd and then the show at 10p pulling in the gays and gay friendly.
  
  
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  In the tipline just yesterday: Vallejo's newly renovated Empress Theatre will be showing the gay romance, "Chris & Don: A Love Story", for their September installment of Out at the Empress, their monthly queer film series. I had never heard of either the Empress or the film, but both look intriguing. The Theatre looks gorgeous and the film has great reviews and sounds endearing. Here's a synopsis for you:
  

  A sleeper hit at the Telluride Film Festival, Chris & Don: A Love Story is the true-life story of the passionate three-decade relationship between British writer Christopher Isherwood (whose Berlin Stories was the basis for all incarnations of the much-beloved cabaret) and American portrait painter Don Bachardy, thirty years his junior. From Isherwood’s Kit-Kat-Club years in Weimar-era Germany (the inspiration for his most famous work) to the couple’s first meeting on the sun-kissed beaches of 1950s Malibu, their against-all-odds saga is brought to dazzling life by a treasure trove of multimedia. Bachardy’s contemporary reminiscences (in the Santa Monica home he shared with Isherwood until his death in 1986) artfully interact with archival footage, rare home movies (with glimpses of glitterati pals W.H. Auden, Igor Stravinsky and Tennessee Williams), reenactments, and, most sweetly, whimsical animations based on the cat-and-horse cartoons the pair used in their personal correspondence. With Isherwood’s status as an out-and-proud gay maverick, and Bachardy’s eventual artistic triumph away from the considerable shadow of his life partner, Chris & Don: A Love Story is above all a joyful celebration of a most extraordinary couple.

  The evening will begin at 6:30p with a cocktail reception and the film will play at 8p, both (of course) on Friday, September 19th at the Empress Theatre at 330 Virginia Street in downtown Vallejo. The cost for the film is $10.