A dinner to die for? CBAA, SPA will serve up 'Cafe Murder'

MOSES LAKE – Dinner and a homicide, anyone?

If so, Columbia Basin Allied Arts and Sunshine Performing Arts will oblige when they stage “Café Murder” during a pair of dinner theater performances on Friday and Saturday, Jan. 23-24, at Moses Lake’s Best Western Lakefront Hotel.

The comedic, interactive mystery centers around Rosemary St. John’s birthday party at a restaurant with her kooky sisters. When the quirky, overly dramatic Rosemary disappears and is presumed murdered, the audience must figure out who did her in. The chef? The waiter? The maitre’d?

Everyone is a suspect. Over dessert, guests will be drawn into a playful whodunit involving Rosemary and her lively circle.

“Dinner theater is basically the great American pastime for the arts,” CBAA executive director Shawn Cardwell said in press release. “It’s being offered in towns all around us, but not here in Grant County, so we thought, ‘Let’s do it!’”

Available at www.cba-arts.org, tickets are $80 for the show, pasta dinner and salad, sides, and desserts. Meal options include lasagna and chicken alfredo pasta. Soft drinks are included, and a no-host bar will be available. Doors open at 6 p.m. with dinner served at 6:30 p.m., followed by the play. Doors close at 7 p.m. Seating is on a first-come basis, but groups of eight can reserve a table.

Café Murder’s cast includes Victoria Drake as Rosemary, along with Clark Dalton (Maitre’d), Virginia Berry -Stearns (Marjorie), Becca Grommesh (Melanie), Rebecca Dalton (Valerie), Dave Stearns (Volleny), Emily Duvall (Chef Franc), Zhané Serrano (Waitress), and Justin Martin (Harris).

Serrano is a founding member of Sunshine Performing Arts, a new regional nonprofit offering children’s theater camps and theater and musical productions.

“Our organization is celebrating one year of being an arts nonprofit,” said Serrano. “We are incredibly grateful to be collaborating with CBAA to bring something fresh and new to our community.”

Columbia Basin Allied Arts has long provided diverse cultural enrichment and education through the arts in Grant County. Along with the upcoming dinner theater, programs and productions in 2026 include:

—    Friday Film Series (next up, Sundance Festival film shorts, Feb. 6);

—    Premier Series (Artageous, March 6);

—    Children’s programs (Missoula Children’s Theater, free weeklong theater camp during spring break);

—    Free summer events including Music at the Market, Art on Third, and the UMANI Festival.