Line #10 Main/DinnerTheatre


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7	Dinner Theatre is a format that caters usually to elderly patrons. The building will be both a restaurant and theatre. In some places food is served during the show, others it's served beforehand.
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9	At conventional dinner theaters, the plays chosen tend to be TheMusical, or other LowestCommonDenominator crowd-pleasing fare. Another take comes in the form of original spectacles in custom-built arenas designed to entertain family crowds, such as the RealLife ''[[Theatre/MedievalTimesDinnerAndTournament Medieval Times]]'' chain. A popular variation has been to mix dinner theater with {{LARP}} MurderMystery theatre, where the audience takes part in the proceedings to solve the crime. Alternatively, the show is set up as an event that encourages mingling between audience and actors, a concept pioneered by ''Tony 'n' Tina's Wedding'' in TheEighties.
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11	In fiction, this is usually portrayed as the lowest job an actor can get.
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13	!!Examples
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15	[[folder:Film - Animated]]
16	* ''WesternAnimation/The3LittlePigsTheMovie'': [[TheBigBadWolf Big Boss]], owner of ''The Inn of the Gentle Wolf'', plans out a lucrative event for his establishment, where he intends to serve pigs Wally and Beemo to his carnivorous guests, after the two provide some entertainment with a song & dance.
17	* At the beginning of ''WesternAnimation/ShrekTheThird'', Prince Charming is reduced to performing dinner theater to an unappreciative audience who cheer on Shrek (who is supposed to be the ''villain'' in the play) instead of him.
18	* ''WesternAnimation/ThePiratesWhoDontDoAnythingAVeggieTalesMovie'': The main characters begin the plot as pirates in a pirate-themed dinner-theatre restaurant, depicted as cheesy. The main characters' hatred of working there fuels the plot and their desire for something more interesting.
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21	[[folder:Film - Live-Action]]
22	* The film ''Film/AutoFocus'' recreates Creator/BobCrane having to make do with these kind of theatre roles to make ends meet, after ''Series/HogansHeroes'' ends.
23	* ''Film/TheCableGuy'' takes his increasingly reluctant buddy to an outpost of ''Medieval Times'' and they wind up duking it out ''Star Trek'' style in the arena itself.
24	* ''Film/{{Soapdish}}'' has Creator/KevinKline's washed-up character performing ''Theatre/DeathOfASalesman'' at a Dinner Theatre. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XAI1SjHcyQA His audience is divided between the oblivious and the uninterested.]]
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27	[[folder:Literature]]
28	* Joan Hess's ''The Murder at the Murder at the Mimosa Inn'' takes place during an all-weekend MurderMystery event, which includes DinnerTheater performances for the "crime", investigation updates, and denouement.
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31	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
32	* ''Series/TheGoldenGirls'' Has an episode ("The Case of the Libertine Belle") that fits this trope. The gang is treated to a Murder Mystery Dinner Party at an upscale bed and breakfast. The twist: [[spoiler:The first mystery is a decoy. Blanche unwittingly takes part in the second act.]] HilarityEnsues
33	* Part of the backstory in the ''Series/{{Monk}}'' episode "Mr. Monk Gets Drunk" reveals that Monk ruined a murder mystery theater weekend by solving the mystery in the first twelve minutes, causing the organizers to have to refund all the guests.
34	* In the ''Series/PokerFace'' episode, [[Recap/PokerFaceS01E06ExitStageDeath "Exit Stage Death"]], a murder takes place during a performance at one of these.
35	* One episode of ''Series/SaturdayNightLive'' featured Chris Farley as an actor playing the victim in a cheesy murder mystery play ("Eeny Meeny Miny Murder, Catch a Killer in the Mansion of Flurder"). Because his parents were in the audience, he overplayed his death scene, outright refusing to die so he could keep on overacting, eventually driving everyone away.
36	* In the episode [[Recap/SupernaturalS02E18HollywoodBabylon "Hollywood Babylon"]] of ''Series/{{Supernatural}}'', a character named Gerard St. James is playing Willy Loman in ''Theatre/DeathOfASalesman''.
37	-->'''Gerard St. James:''' Speaking of, I'm playing Willy in a dinner theater production of Salesman at Costa Mesa, all next month. (He hands Dean a flyer) You get a free pepper steak with the coupon.
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40	[[folder:Western Animation]]
41	* ''WesternAnimation/BobsBurgers'': The episode "Hamburger Dinner Theater" has Linda trying her hand at dinner theater by staging a bizarre musical murder mystery at the restaurant.
42	* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Chowder}}'', Shnitzel [[PlayingATree plays a tree]] in Mung Daal's dinner theater.
43	* ''WesternAnimation/DanVs.'' has an episode called "Dan Vs. Ye Olde Shakespeare Dinner Theatre". Both Dan and an actor at the theatre are perfectly rude to one another, but the actor slapping Chris in the face with his [[InsistentTerminology epeé]] and giving him a shiner that streches from chin to brow seals them as worthy of revenge.
44	* ''WesternAnimation/KingOfTheHill'' had "Abracapasta", a dinner theatre specializing in magic.
45	** And there was the disco-themed murder-mystery dinner theater on a train.
46	* On ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'':
47	** Creator/MarkHamill performs a ''Franchise/StarWars''-themed dinner theater version of ''Theatre/GuysAndDolls''.
48	--->[[ActorISTheTitleCharacter Mark Hamill IS Nathan Detroit. Pepper Steak IS the entree.]]
49	** Krusty The Klown also appears in ''Theatre/KingLear'' at the Springfield Dinner Theatre. Homer, a restaurant critic at the time, thinks the food isn't near so hammy as the acting. (It doesn't help that Krusty didn't know that the play is a tragedy.)
50	** The family also went to a magic-themed dinner theater.
51	* ''WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants'' has three episodes in which the Krusty Krab is temporarily turned into one: "Culture Shock", "Squirrel Jokes" and "The Play's the Thing".
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54	[[folder:Real Life]]
55	* Some examples in UsefulNotes/{{France}}:
56	** Cabarets, particularly in UsefulNotes/{{Paris}}, such as the ''Moulin Rouge'', the ''Theatre/CrazyHorse'', the ''Lido''...
57	** Also in Paris, the ''café-théâtre'' Le Café de la Gare house the show business debuts of a number of famous comedians or actors in The70s, including Creator/{{Coluche}}, Creator/HenriGuybet, Martin Lamotte, Creator/GerardDepardieu, Creator/PatrickDewaere, Miou-Miou and Creator/GerardLanvin.
58	** Strasbourg had the ''Barabli'', which featured stage plays and stand-up comedy in [[UsefulNotes/GermanLanguage Alsatian language]] and was founded by Creator/GermainMuller. Its successor is the ''Choucrouterie'', which derives its name from sauerkraut and prominently features the meal on its menu.
59	* ''[[https://www.interactivetheatre.com.au/faulty-towers-the-dining-experience/ Faulty Towers The Dining Experience]]'' is a dinner theatre tribute to ''Series/FawltyTowers''.
60	* The [[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/OTFCC_2004 2004 Official Transformers Collectors Convention]] had planned a ''Franchise/{{Transformers}}''-themed LARP Murder Mystery-style dinner event titled "Who Shot Optimus Prime?" featuring Autobot detective Nightbeat, but because the hosting entertainment company wanted more money to change their format than the convention organizers could afford, those attending the event got the generic [[http://tfwiki.net/wiki/DEATH_BY_CHOCOLATE DEATH BY CHOCOLATE]] starring Detective Harry Bottoms instead. But, at least the attendees got Optimus Prime and Megatron posters signed by Peter Cullen and Frank Welker along with their meal, so the night wasn't a total loss.
61	* ''Star Wars: Galactic Starcruiser'', a resort offshoot of ''Ride/StarWarsGalaxysEdge'' in Disney Hollywood Studios, Florida, is effectively two full days of dinner theater and LARP that started in March 2022. The story is that the attending vacation-goers are spending time aboard a luxury Corellian cruiser, the ''Halcyon'', which suddenly becomes a subversive battleground between the Resistance and the First Order; actors will routinely engage with the audience and assign missions, including a proper visit to the ''Galaxy's Edge'' setting, in order to entertain and move the story along until it culminates on the second night, followed by departure back to Earth the following morning after breakfast. Unfortunately, with a $1,200 a night per person price tag and launching in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis, the experience proved to be a commercial failure and ended on September 30, 2023. It is unclear what will happen to the cruiser/hotel.
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Context Main / DinnerTheatre