A leopard is on the loose at the Stanford Theatre, and that’s very good news: It means that the 98-year-old Palo Alto movie palace is scheduled to open once again.

The leopard is Baby, and he is the title character in Howard Hawks’ 1937 screwball comedy classic “Bringing Up Baby,” which is on a double bill with the Mae West vehicle “She Done Him Wrong” on July 1. Both star Cary Grant, who is the subject of a joint retrospective with director Alfred Hitchcock during July, August and early September as the theater reopens after being closed the past eight months for renovations.

All four Hitchcock films that star Grant are slated to screen, including a 1940s double feature of “Notorious” and “Suspicion,” on July 22-23.

Three of Hitchcock’s Northern California-shot films (none with Grant) are also on the schedule: “Shadow of a Doubt” (Aug. 24-25), filmed in Santa Rosa; “Vertigo” (Aug. 26-27), filmed mostly in San Francisco; and “The Birds” (Sept. 2-3), which opens in San Francisco’s Union Square before settling into Bodega Bay.

The series was programmed byDavid Woodley Packard,戴维和露西尔帕卡德Foundati谁的on bought the theater in 1987.

As always, all films will be projected in 35mm, most preceded by live organ music, and ticket prices are an inflation-busting $7 per program ($5 for seniors age 65 and older and youths 18 and younger). Concession prices are old-school, too; it is possible to get a movie ticket, small bag of popcorn and soda for $10.

Stanford Theatre Foundation General Manager Cyndi Mortensen-Colombetti told The Chronicle that the theater’s renovations mostly involved HVAC (heating, ventilation and air conditioning) upgrades, and that more work will be needed later in the year. She did not specify when the theater might close for those additional upgrades.

The Stanford Theatre wasthe first theater to closeat the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, shutting its doors in the first week of March 2020, about two weeks before the federal government ordered a general lockdown.It was among the last to reopen,in July 2022.

Add to that the past eight months of closure for the upgrades, and the theater has been open just four months out of the past 40.

Reach G. Allen Johnson:ajohnson@sfchronicle.com; Twitter:@BRFilmsAllen