In the early 1960s, she entered the stage company of
Fantasio Piccoli in
Bolzano, giving her first performances in 1963 in plays like
Binario cieco by ,
Our Town by
Thornton Wilder and
O di uno o di niente by
Luigi Pirandello. After her engagement with Fo's company ended, she left Milan again, working with directors such as ,
Damiano Damiani and Giovanni Poli. Subsequent roles followed in
Nino Manfredi's
Between Miracles (1971), Elio Petri's
The Working Class Goes to Heaven (1971) and Vittorio De Sica's
Lo chiameremo Andrea (1972). and Carlo Bertolazzi's
El nost Milan in 1979, the latter directed by
Giorgio Strehler. Melato and Lina Wertmüller eventually reunited for the filming of
Summer Night (1986), a variation on
Swept Away. Notable theatre appearances of this decade include
Euripides'
Medea (1986) and
William Gibson's
The Miracle Worker (1988), both directed by . In the early 1990s, Melato returned permanently to the stage, reducing her presence on the screen and on television. She signed a long-term contract with the Teatro Stabile di Genova (now ), where she appeared in productions such as
Karel Čapek's
The Makropulos Affair (1993),
Copi's
Tango barbaro (1995) and
Eugene O'Neill's
Mourning Becomes Electra (1997). One of the rare film appearances during this time was the 1993
The End Is Known. Due to increasing health issues, she ended her career in 2010. ==Personal life and death==