Broadway on Main: Inside Downtown Myrtle Beach’s New 300-Seat Theater Opening Late 2026

For most of a century, the Broadway Theater sat at 811 Main Street in downtown Myrtle Beach with its back to the ocean and its marquee facing the town. It opened in 1938, the same year as the drugstore and the dress shop beside it, in the years when Main Street was where the Grand Strand went to shop, eat and see a picture show. Then the town moved toward the highway and the boardwalk, the theater went dark, and the three brick storefronts stood empty for years while the ocean kept rolling in two blocks away.

Late this year, if the schedule holds, the lights come back on. The City of Myrtle Beach has spent more than two years turning the Broadway and its two neighbors into a single 300-seat performing arts center, with Coastal Carolina University running the stage. At an October workshop, City Council reached general agreement that the marquee should read “Broadway on Main,” with “Myrtle Beach” and “Performing Arts” painted across the two adjoining facades, according to MyHorryNews. The name is not final, and the opening date depends on construction, but downtown Myrtle Beach is about to get something it has not had in a generation: a real theater, at a walkable scale, a short stroll from the sand.

Here is what the project is, why the name became a debate, and how a theater night on Main Street will fit into a North Myrtle Beach stay once the doors open.

The Theater at a Glance

Details come from MyHorryNews and The Post and Courier reporting through November 2, 2026. The name, cost and opening date remain subject to council action and construction progress.

Three Storefronts, One Stage

The design keeps the three mid-century facades and joins the buildings behind them into a single venue, which is why the name will read across all three fronts. The Broadway Theater at 811 gets its marquee back, with white lettering over a black sign face. The old J&J Drug Co. sign at 809 will carry “Performing Arts.” And 807, the Helen Mates shop, will say “Myrtle Beach,” though that signage needs review by the State Historic Preservation Office and the National Park Service because the project uses historic tax credits, MyHorryNews reported.

The Mates building has the best backstory. It opened as the Argonne Forest Café, founded by a World War I veteran after he came home, and his daughter later turned it into a children’s clothing store and then the dress shop that gave it its name. At the 2024 groundbreaking, Carolyn Mates told MyHorryNews that her mother would have loved to see the building become a theater. The three structures all date to 1938, according to county land records.

Cost figures in public reporting have ranged from $22.3 million, the figure the city used at groundbreaking and in January council discussions, with roughly $4.9 million expected back in historic tax credits, to $31 million in MyHorryNews’ November report. The project also ran about four months behind its original summer 2026 target after crews hit unexpected conditions inside the old buildings and had to reorder materials, The Post and Courier reported in January.

Why the Name Matters

A name is a small thing until it goes on a marquee. Council members considered The Downtown Theatre, The Strand Theatre and The Theatre on Main before settling, informally, on keeping Broadway, which Councilman Mike Lowder pointed out was the theater’s original name. The choice ties the new venue to the building’s history rather than to a brand, and in a town where Broadway at the Beach is already a household name among visitors, “Broadway on Main” draws a clear line between the entertainment complex on the bypass and the historic street downtown.

The sharper debate was over Coastal Carolina University’s request to put its logo on at least one facade. Several council members resisted. Lowder wanted the university’s branding inside, with the marquee focused on Myrtle Beach; Mayor Pro Tem Debbie Conner noted the operating agreement runs only five years, and Councilman Bill McClure questioned whether CCU would stay beyond that, since the university is building its own theater on campus. Mayor Mark Kruea said council would take the question up with university staff and noted that signs can be changed. No vote was taken, and Assistant City Manager Josh Kay told council the naming needs to be settled soon to keep the project on schedule.

What Coastal Carolina Brings to Main Street

Under the five-year lease, Coastal Carolina University will operate the theater and cover its operating costs, which the mayor estimated at about $500,000 a year, in exchange for at least 150 use days for performances, film screenings, rehearsals, classes, lectures and concerts. Outside groups get 100 days. CCU President Michael Benson said at the groundbreaking that the city was starving for a venue of this kind, according to MyHorryNews.

For visitors, the practical effect is a steady calendar. A 300-seat room run by a university theater and music program means student productions, visiting lecturers, film series and touring acts that are too small for the Alabama Theatre or the Carolina Opry and too big for a bar stage. It is the kind of programming the coast’s big production houses do not offer, and it will run through the off-season, when the beach is quiet and a weeknight show downtown is exactly the sort of thing a winter visitor is looking for.

Downtown’s Arts & Innovation District

The theater is the centerpiece of the city’s Arts & Innovation District, the blocks bounded by Main Street, Broadway Street and Kings Highway that the city has been working to revive since the oceanfront’s tourism center shifted south toward the boardwalk and Ocean Boulevard. Mayor Brenda Bethune said at the 2024 groundbreaking that within three to five years the district would be unrecognizable.

Pieces are falling into place. Long Bay Theatre, the area’s community theater company, opened a 200-seat home at 728 Main Street this fall, a block from the Broadway, and we covered its debut in our report on Long Bay Theatre’s new downtown venue. With two theaters within a block of each other, Main Street is on its way to becoming a real evening destination again, and the oceanfront boardwalk, with its holiday light displays and the SkyWheel, is a short walk east.

A Night Out on Main Street

Once the theater opens, a downtown evening writes itself. Arrive early and walk the boardwalk from the SkyWheel toward 2nd Avenue Pier, where the ocean breeze and the lights make the best free show in town. Dinner options cluster along Ocean Boulevard and the side streets around Main, and the Arts & Innovation District is adding restaurants and galleries as the theater project nears completion. After the show, the boardwalk is a few minutes away for a nightcap or a late walk on the sand. Our guide to things to do in Myrtle Beach at night covers the stretch in detail.

Parking downtown is easier than visitors expect outside of summer; city lots and street parking near Main Street are plentiful in the off-season, when most of the theater’s first programming will run.

Where to Stay for a Theater Night

North Myrtle Beach is about 25 minutes from Main Street by Highway 17, close enough for an evening show and far enough to come home to a quieter beach. Windy Hill and Crescent Beach at the south end of town are the shortest drive, with Barefoot Landing and the Alabama Theatre in between for a second show night. Ocean Drive puts Main Street’s shag clubs within walking distance for the nights you stay close to home, and Cherry Grove, at the north end, is the quietest base of all.

Couples who build a trip around theater and dinner tend to prefer our oceanfront condos, with balconies over the water and off-season rates that make a long weekend easy. Families and groups find room to spread out in our oceanfront homes. For the rest of the trip, start with our pillar guide to things to do in Myrtle Beach.

Frequently Asked Questions

Catch the Opening Season

When the marquee lights up on Main Street for the first time in decades, the people in the seats will be the ones who happened to be at the beach that week. Winter is the quietest season on the Grand Strand and, as it turns out, the one when downtown has the most to offer after dark.

Sources: MyHorryNews (Nov. 2, 2026; July 2024); The Post and Courier (Jan. 27, 2026); City of Myrtle Beach; Coastal Carolina University. Featured image is an illustration and does not depict the actual building design. Name, cost and opening date are subject to change; confirm with the City of Myrtle Beach.