RYAH COOLEY

Once upon a time, the Central Coast—and all of California, really—was a lawless wasteland. But not as much of a lawless wasteland as say, Arizona, if the Great American Melodrama’s hilarious farcical play, How the West Was Really Won, is anything to go off of.  In a series of short stories that poke fun at […]

Oh my cod! You’ve got to sea this show.  Still with me? Then definitely surf on over to the Great American Melodrama for oceanic puns and Abba inspired song satires galore in the hilarious Mamma Mia parody, Pappa Pia. While I love Mamma Mia, it always seemed like a stretch that creator Catherine Johnson listened […]

You’re minding your own business, running an inn with no customers, when an about-to-be-dead pirate runs in, gives you a treasure map to hide, swears you to secrecy, and then has the nerve to get captured by his own men. It’s a wild goose chase from start to finish, but the Great American Melodrama’s quirky […]

Two wannabe cops and then two hitmen walk into a motel room. Oh, and there are actually two conjoined motel rooms, eight doors, an embezzler, and a set of bagpipes. Each twist, literal and figurative, sends audiences further and further down a rabbit hole of zany, laugh-out-loud comedy in the Great American Melodrama’s adaptation of […]

“Women just aren’t that funny,” says every wannabe comedian bro on Twitter. But you know what, y’all? It’s 2019, and election time is just a mere 21 months away. So extend some benevolence to your nearest bro and take them out for a heart- and mind-changing night of theater to see Steel Magnolias (followed by […]

He ran and ran, but Mickey just couldn’t keep up with the speeding ambulance carrying away his creator’s body to a cryonics clinic. Fast forward 50 years, after that fateful Dec. 16, 1966, and Walt Disney has a crucial choice to make: To thaw or not to thaw? Bored curmudgeon Samuel Clemens (also known as […]

The hills of San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara County are dotted with wine grapes as far as the eye can see. But in those twisted vines, former Santa Maria Times journalist Steve Corbett saw something more–a tale of bloody vengeance and even enlightenment.  After five years of covering undocumented immigrants, outlaw bikers, the Michael […]

“We don’t say died anymore, we say passed.” Just that one sentence shook Central Coast author Christine Bell‘s world a bit when her neighbor said it in the midst of a family tragedy. The Santa Barbara-based writer realized there just isn’t space in our lives anymore for grief and mourning, which in turn inspired her […]

In a nondescript industrial area on Front Street in Grover Beach, a hub for artists is tucked away, just out of sight. The words “Channel Island Arts Inc.” in faded paint are just above a newer, brighter coat of paint that reads “Pottery Coast.” The creative makers spot was opened just a few months ago […]