Kuster moved his film operation to the former Arts and Crafts Hall on Monte Verde Street, nearby in Carmel, which he had previously purchased.

After the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, the village received an influx of artists and other creative people escaping the disaster area.

The early Carmel bohemians participated in events held at the club, including writers and poets Mary Austin, George Sterling, Robinson Jeffers and Sinclair Lewis.

[6] American painters, such as William Merritt Chase, Xavier Martinez, Mary DeNeale Morgan and C. Chapel Judson offered six weeks of instruction for $15.

[4] An article in The Mercury Herald commented, "a fever of activity seems to have seized the community and each newcomer is immediately inoculated and begins with great enthusiasm to do something ... with plays, studios and studies".

[1][8] In the meantime, theatrical activities in the town became so popular that Kuster had built a competing theater, the Theatre of the Golden Bough, in 1924, with its grand opening on June 6, 1924.

Kuster, a musician and lawyer from Los Angeles, had relocated to Carmel to establish his own theater and school.

Kuster was a musician and lawyer from Los Angeles who relocated to Carmel to establish his own theatre and school.

He then traveled to Europe for a year to study production techniques in Berlin and to negotiate for rights to produce English and European plays in the United States.

[7] In 1935, Kuster renegotiated his lease with the movie tenants, allowing him to produce a stage play one weekend each month.

[1] In 1950, Kuster sold the Golden Bough Court, the property that once surrounded the theater's entrance, to Sumral and Ruth Otrich.

[12] In 1940, Kuster returned to Carmel; the Monte Verde Street theatre's lease had expired, and he renamed it Golden Bough Playhouse and again presented plays and films year-round.

The main auditorium, called Golden Bough Playhouse, originally with 330 seats and a large stage, was designed to present both movies and live performances.

[22] On September 22, 1994, the Golden Bough Playhouse reopened with Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado, followed by Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream.

[8] By 1997, the second phase of a capital campaign concluded when a $300,000 challenge grant from the David and Lucile Packard Foundation was successfully matched.

[8] Olympia Dukakis and her husband Louis Zorich presented their adaptaion of Anton Chekhov's The Cherry Orchard in July and August, 2001.

The first phase of remodeling was completed 2011 and included safety updates, a digital projection system, a double-revolving stage and upgrades to the Circle Theatre.