This 60-year anniversary wasn’t supposed to happen.
Three years ago, Ryan Thorsen found out the iconic Mister A’s was scheduled to close. The lease was up, and there were plans to turn the god’s-eye restaurant into penthouse offices. Legendary run, good night. Thorsen had been GM and right-hand to restaurateur Bertrand Hug for 10-ish years. His crew of 100 employees were family. “What is going to happen to all of these people?” he asked. So, he got to work finding them a home. He kicked tires on various spots across San Diego (Red Fox Room; a couple of places in North County).
After intense dinner services, he’d run down the hill to Starlite and bring back burgers for everyone. The new and old guards would finish up side work, laugh it off, ponder their uncertain futures. It was in the midst of those late-night sessions Thorsen realized the city shouldn’t lose this.
Hug told Thorsen if he could get the lease extended, he’d sell to him. So the young GM approached Manchester Financial.
“I was scared shitless—I’d never done a lease negotiation before,” he says. He pulled it off and saved this iconic thing. Thorsen rebuilt the bar that faces Balboa Park. He reopened the famed, ornate Blue Room and launched jazz brunch (it’s jammed). He made A’s a scene again.
PARTNER CONTENT
Celebrating six decades as of last month, the place jumps with history. There’s the original coffee pot (a massive copper contraption that looks like a blinged-out R2-D2), the 1960s-era ice buckets for wine, and the priceless photos, including one of the soul and center of it all: Jerry Capozzelli.
The beloved maitre’d here for almost 40 years, he passed in 2023. A’s next chapter is for everyone, but especially Jerry.
