The Great American Melodrama builds largest building in Oceano

The Great American Melodrama and Vaudeville in Oceano is completing construction on a new 14,000 square foot building that will house its box office, administrative offices, and design shops.

The Melodrama has been presenting live professional theater on the central coast for more than 40 years. Its new headquarters will be on Highway 1 next to the original location where productions will still be held.

The new building was built to house the sets and costumes for their seven annual shows.

“It will be where we are going to construct our scenery and our costumes. We are going to store a bunch of our sets as well. We’ve got sets going, back about 40 years, so famous plays that we have done before like Scary Poppins; we keep that set. Every year we do a holiday show, and we store that set every year as well,” said the artistic director Dan Schultz.

The two-story building is one of the largest construction projects in Oceano. The facility is environmentally friendly featuring solar panels and energy-efficient windows.

The Melodrama will be wrapping up construction in the next few weeks and hopes for the building to be opened by the holidays.