Qualla: The Mural Under the Paint

The Mural Under the Paint: Introduction

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

When restorers began peeling paint from the ceiling of the Uptown Theatre in downtown Napa, they were not expecting to find gods and heroes. But layer by layer, as decades of latex and enamel came away, an original Greco-Roman mural emerged — classical figures painted in 1937 and buried under successive renovations since the 1970s. Artists were brought in to restore the work to its original form, a process that took until 2009. The mural had survived being subdivided, neglected, and forgotten. In a sense, it had been waiting.

The Mural Under the Paint: Opening Night, 1937

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Lawrence Borg built the Uptown Theatre as an Art Deco showpiece, and its debut on August 12, 1937, was a proper occasion. The opening film was Ever Since Eve, a Warner Bros. comedy starring Marion Davies — light fare for a building that took itself seriously. The exterior was str...

The Mural Under the Paint: The Slow Diminishment

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

What happened to the Uptown in the second half of the twentieth century was a story repeated in small-city theaters across America. In 1973, the auditorium was divided in half to create a two-screen venue — a concession to changing economics that sacrificed grandeur for efficienc...

The Mural Under the Paint: Coppola, Sound Labs, and a Second Act

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Real estate developer George Altamura purchased the shuttered theater in 2000 with a vision that ran counter to the multiplex trend: restore the Uptown to a single grand room and reopen it as a live entertainment venue. In 2003, he announced a partnership with several investors, ...

The Mural Under the Paint: Shaken but Standing

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

The 2014 South Napa earthquake, a magnitude 6.0 that struck in the early morning of August 24, tested the theater's resurrection. The ceiling — including the painstakingly restored mural — was damaged, and the building was red-tagged until structural engineers could confirm its s...