In 1952, the puppeteers moved to the premises of the then Regional Pioneer House on Janka Kráľa Street no. 1. The artistic direction was determined by the playwright and director Ján Romanovský. At the end of the 1950s, Nitra puppets gained national recognition thanks to their masterful puppet animation technique. One of the most artistically successful and at the same time attractive productions of this period was the staging of Šibal Pakala (1959). The director was Romanian Floric Teodora.
July 1960 brought the transformation of the Puppet Ensemble into an independent West Slovak Puppet Theater. J. Romanovský's strong views on the form of puppet theater were supported by the playwright Milan Ivák. The 1960s were a period of balance and stability in the creation of theater. The success of the ensemble was based on an excellently prepared and experienced art ensemble. The theater collaborated with important artists from Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Thanks to this, several interesting productions were created, such as G. Diezmanann's play With the Wind for the Race (1964) directed by Karel Brožek and the innovative puppet title of Ľ. Feldeka Figliar Botafogo (1967) directed by Ján Hyžnaya, who later became the main director of the theater.
The year 1970 brought the change of the name of the institution to the Puppet Theater of Nitra and the end of the directing work of J. Romanovský. Ján Hižnay took over the baton of the internal director. The theater building was in a state of disrepair for a long time, which in 1977 led to a ban on the use of premises for the public. Nitra puppets were forced to fully reorient themselves to the touring repertoire. For this reason, the puppet theater began to disappear from the consciousness of the Nitra public.
Despite the unfavorable conditions, the management of the theater managed to secure a repertoire with which it was possible to present itself abroad. Under Hižnay's direction, Božena Lenčová's play About Rama and the Net (1971) was staged, which is one of the most important puppet productions that were created in our country in the 1970s. Nitra puppets have successfully introduced themselves to it in Bulgaria or Cairo, Egypt.
With other productions, Nitra was performed in Belgium, India, Iraq and repeatedly in France during the 1970s and 1980s. The masters of the Nitra puppet school were asked on television to create puppet series and bands for children.
The difficult situation with the spaces that plagued Nitra puppets for a long fifteen years was ended by the gain of the former theater building of the Andrej Bagar Theater in 1993.
The arrival of Karol Spišák as director and Ondrej Špišák as the theater's internal director was decisive for the future of the theater in 1994. O. Spišák recorded numerous creative successes and Nitra, thanks to his inventiveness, has long been the artistic top of Slovak puppet theaters. By participating in festivals, the theater has built a strong reputation throughout Central Europe. Faust was a groundbreaking production of this period. The authors of the text, O. Spišák and I. Gontko, elaborated the motifs of the works of Ch. Marlow's Doctor Faustus and JW Goethe's Faust. It was a contemporary interpretation with a live rock band. The production attracted mainly young audiences to the theater, who had previously not been interested in visiting the puppet theater. Since 1999, the theater has been operating under the name Old Theater in Nitra. At this stage, the theater recorded its greatest artistic success to date. The name of Karol Spišák was merged by Nitra deputies with the name of the theater in 2009.
In 2011, the Old Theater of Karol Spišák celebrated its 60th anniversary. The Mayor of the City of Nitra Jozef Dvonč awarded the theater the Award of the Mayor of the City of Nitra for artistic activity and representation of the city at home and abroad. Among the members of the art ensemble, actress Oľga Schrameková also won the Mayor's Award.
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