The James McCabe Theater, home to the Village Players, is Hillsborough County's oldest all-volunteer community theater.
The building it's house in is more than 100 years old and was originally the Valrico Civic Club. It's currently on the county's register of historic places.
Now, the building comes to life through music and acting. The village players put on at least five shows a year.
Kids and adults practice their skills here, from technical lighting and stage production to acting.
The community theater wants to spread happiness and preserve the little slice of history.
Village Players Peter Terzian and Gail Pierce say the historic building is beautiful but requires extra care.
"The building is a 1915 building, and as quaint as it is, anything that goes wrong, multiply it times what, five, ten?" Pierce said. "We're always keeping a list of all the things we need to do, so we always are looking for people to volunteer construction-wise or because we don't want to do anything wrong because it's a historical site."
Just this past weekend, the Village Players held auditions for their upcoming production, The Music Man, which will take place in August.
"You need to have a theater like this in the community where a lot of others have, have filled in spaces at malls and such. And they do great shows too. But just this ambiance of this real old theater," Terzian said. Pierce added, "and how long it's been around. You know, a lot of them don't last that long. It's not because they're not good. It's just financially difficult."
The theater also does dinner theater, a fundraiser to keep the building in good condition.
Tickets for that are $35 but they are looking for a restaurant to help.
