The Chestnut Street frontage was occupied by an entrance hall behind an elaborate classical facade with Corinthian columns and a central arch topped by a clock and a sculpture of an eagle.

[4] In the Philadelphia Evening Telegraph review, it was described as a "family performance" and "entirely unexceptionable" and acknowledged as a "great success" due to the audience's obvious enjoyment and the size of crowd.

[2] The Philadelphia Times reported that all but one of the theatres connected to Fox had "found their end amid charred timbers and smoking ruins".

[13] Goodwin died in 1881[12]: 166  and that same year Philadelphia clothier and real estate businessman Joseph Monroe Bennett (a former partner of John Wanamaker) purchased the site of the theatre.

[21][22] The Chestnut Street Opera House (CSOH) presented productions and events starring several notable entertainers and figures of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The celebrated Italian tragedienne Adelaide Ristori performed the title role in Euripides's Medea at the theatre during her 1875 American tour.

It starred German-born American actress Mathilde Cottrelly, the comic opera singer Marion Manola, vaudeville entertainer Digby Bell, contralto Laura Joyce Bell, tenor Harry Macdonough, and the German-born American actor Hubert Wilke (1855–1940).

[26] On May 22, 1882, a musical adaptation of Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin by composer Caryl Florio and dramatist H. Wayne Ellis premiered at the CSOH.

[27] Philadelphia actor George W. Munroe had the first major success of his career when he joined the touring production of Scott Marble's Over the Garden Wall when it reached the CSOH in August/September 1884.

[32] On April 15, 1886, Walt Whitman delivered a free public lecture on Abraham Lincoln from the stage of the opera house; an event paid for by two prominent Philadelphians: journalist Talcott Williams and lawyer Thomas Donaldson.

Others in the cast included Vivian Rushmore as the fairy godmother, Vernon Castle as Atzel, David C. Montgomery as Punks, Fred Stone as Spooks, Allene Crater as Romneya, Lillian Lee as Dollbabia, Queenie Vassar as Freakette, Peggy Wood as Valerie, and Lydia Lopokova as a featured dancer.

Frolics, while headlined by violinist and actor Herman Timberg, was mainly successful due to the performance of the African-American comic duo Buck & Bubbles.

In response to this untenable situation, one of the actors in the show, Nat Nazarro, arrived at the theatre with two lawyers and two deputy sheriffs and confiscated the sheet music of the orchestra, the production's costumes, and some of the sets just prior to the scheduled April 5, 1923, performance time.

Nazarro refused to return the necessary items for the show to proceed until the entire cast had been paid its back wages in full.

[39] On Christmas Day 1935, the CSOH presented the premiere of Zoe Akins's O Evening Star, a play about a supposedly fictional actress Amy Bellaire.

[40] On November 30, 1936, the CSOH presented the world premiere of George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart's comedic play You Can't Take It with You.