Designed by architect Clarence Sumner Luce, its interior was decorated by painter and designer Frank Hill Smith, who is best known today for the frescoes in the House of Representatives' chamber in the Massachusetts State House, and whose commission for the venue's main hall paintings has been described by the American Art Directory and historian John Tauranac as one of his definitive works.

Following the introduction of moving pictures, the opera house saw a steady decline and by the time the venue was purchased by E. M. Loew in 1945, The Film Daily described it as a "once-famous theater".

At the front gable were panels done in Victorian majolica of sock and buskin[clarification needed] on opposite sides of the building's "Opera House" nameplate.

The opera house was effectively rechristened as renovations removed almost entirely all of the building's original elements from the dome's cornice downward, including the aforementioned papier-mâché features, which were replaced by stucco designed and constructed by the Architectural Decorative Company in Boston.

[14][15] Noted performers included John W. Albaugh playing his best-known titular role in Louis XI at the theater's opening show on March 26, 1878.

[1] Numerous plays were performed at the Opera House during the first several decades of its existence, it was one of the venues where William Gillette premiered his 1894 comedy Too Much Johnson.