Matador unveils new Ballard Ave location today

Deridezpols
4 min readMay 22, 2021

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After almost two decades at the corner of NW Market St and Ballard Ave, Matador is reopening at their new location today just down the street at the former Ballard Annex space at 5410 Ballard Ave NW.
To celebrate their move, Matador is rolling back happy hour prices to 2004 when they first opened: This weekend only, you’ll be able to get dishes for $3-$4, including their classic piled-high nachos.

The new location is far bigger than their original spot, with 5,000 square feet of dining space which includes a private events room, outdoor patio, and back bar fashioned into a Mexico City-esque mezcalaria.
Ballard Annex Oyster House closed during the pandemic, and the owners Zak Melang and Nathan Opper decided to move Matador into the bigger space rather than reopening the Annex.

“Our team has put an incredible amount of effort and attention into the entire design of our new Ballard location,” Melang, co-founder of Matador said in a statement about the relocation. “All of our restaurant interiors reflect the craft, heart, soul, and sense of adventure that live inside every good bottle of tequila — and we are taking it a step further in our latest space. We want our guests to feel as though they are stepping into a work of art when they walk through the doors.”
Matador expects their mezcalaria will be the best in the Northwest, with over 60 varieties.

“Our goal is to have something for everybody,” Beverage Director Brian Livesay said in a statement about the new Matador location. “From beginner-friendly, accessible bottles all the way up to rare agave varietals for the advanced mezcal connoisseur and limited-time specialty cocktails, our new mezcaleria aims to be a crowd-pleaser and completely unique spirit experience in the Ballard community.”
Matador’s new location features handcrafted metalwork and bartops, lit with vintage lanterns from Mexico. On the walls are bull skulls carefully painted by artists and tattooists, all for sale and with proceeds going to charity.
Matador plans to be open Sunday through Thursday from 12pm to 11pm, and Friday and Saturday from 12pm to midnight. Happy hour will be from 4pm to 6pm daily, with late-night happy hour on Friday and Saturday from 10pm to last call.

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Kino Lorber Acquires Artsploitation; Gravitas Gets Micaela Wittman’s ‘Clairevoyant’; Freestyle Lands ‘My Tender Matador’; Gotham Shorts Take Flight; Nantucket Fest Additions — Film Briefs

Kino Lorber has acquired distributor Artsploitation Films from its owner and president Ray Murray. Murray and his team will remain with the business as a Kino Lorber brand and division. The deal for Artsploitation, which releases international genre and cutting-edge specialty films, adds 100 titles to Kino Lorber’s library that now has more than 4,000.

Kino Lorber said its new Artsploitation division will acquire rights to 6–8 future theatrical titles per year to bring to market under the banner “Artsploitation, A Kino Lorber Company,” as well as direct to digital and home entertainment releases. It will take over exclusive distribution of all previous Artsploitation titles for all digital media, home video, educational and repertory theatrical markets.
Previously, Kino Lorber handled ancillary media distribution for Artsploitation as a third-party label, as it continues to do for the likes of Zeitgeist Films, Cohen Media Group, Greenwich Entertainment, Palisades Tartan, Virgil Films, Menemsha, Raro Video and others.
Gravitas Ventures has acquired North American rights to Clairevoyant, a mockumentary that marks the directing debut of Micaela Wittman, who also stars. It bows on VOD on June 22.

Wittman (Modern Family, A.P. Bio) stars as Claire Rivers, a spoiled rich girl who hires a camera crew to document her journey as she attempts to shed her ego and attain enlightenment, interviewing a myriad of “spiritual” teachers, most of whom are more concerned with getting Claire’s money than anything else. Wittman and Arthur De Larroche co-directed and co-wrote.
The winning films from The Gotham Film & Media Institute‘s second annual Student Short Film Showcase will debut beginning June 1 in a simultaneous distribution window on JetBlue’s inflight entertainment and Focus Features’ YouTube channel. The deal was done in collaboration with Focus JetBlue and the Westridge Foundation which is awarding $10,000 grants to the winning filmmakers.

The selected shorts, announced during the most recent Gotham Awards, include Cousins (Mandy Marcus, Brooklyn College), Anita (Sushma Khadepaun, Columbia University), Mud & Honey (Molly Sorensen, Temple University), No Law, No Heaven (Kristi Hoi, UCLA) and Things That Happen in the Bathroom (Edward Hancox, University of Texas).
Freestyle Digital Media has acquired international VOD rights to My Tender Matador, a Spanish, LGBTQ-influenced romantic drama that had its world premiere at Venice Days in 2020. It’s directed by Rodrigo Sepúlveda and co-written by Sepúlveda and Juan Elias Tovar based on the novel by Pedro Lemebel and will hit digital outlets June 4.

Set amid the turmoil of 1980s Chile, a passionate relationship flourishes between a lonely transvestite and a young guerrilla during the Pinochet dictatorship. Alfredo Castro, Leonardo Ortizgris and Julieta Zylberberg star.
The Nantucket Film Festival has set its schedule for its in-person events taking place during its 26th annual edition which runs June 17–28, along with finalizing plans for its NFF Garden Series and At the Drive-In schedules, The fest opens with a drive-in screening of Summer of Soul.

New events added to the hybrid festival’s NFF Now: At Home lineup include a conversation with Booksmart screenwriter Katie Silberman and new films Roadrunner: A Film About Anthony Bourdain, Hive by Blerta Basholli, pandemic relationship comedy The End of Us and the first two episodes of Epix’s docuseries Fiasco based on Leon Neyfakh’s podcast.
More info here.

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