"Disappearance from Gualala" Mystery Theater Dinner & Matinee

Mystery Dinner: $50 in advance, includes dinner. Dinner reservations required by February 19. Plus $10 after February 19.

Mystery Matinee: $20 in advance, includes light snacks. No reservations. Tickets via BrownPaperTickets.com or 1.800.838.3006 or at Gualala Arts Center or Dolphin Gallery. Plus $5 day of performance, if seating is available.

No host bar for both performances.

Readers’ Theater presents “Disappearance from Gualala,” a dinner/matinee-mystery play, with live local actors and original script, at Gualala Arts Center. Foyer doors and no-host bar open at 5:30 p.m. For dinner matinee, a four-course dinner will be served during the evening. For the matinee, light snacks will be provided.

This Steven Oakwood mystery, written specifically for local audiences by playwright Dennis Carter of The Sea Ranch and directed by The Sea Ranch thespian Karen Serratoni, is an interactive experience with live actors and original script.

Five years ago, after dropping off their only child at the University of San Francisco for her first day of  college, Gualala residents Greg and Susan Prine celebrated with a quiet evening at home. All seemed well until an unexpected visitor appeared with demands for repayment of a long ago debt. That evening ended with mysterious disappearances and possible foul play.

The four-course dinner menu served throughout the play will be a family style Italian. Starting with the first act, the first course will be antipasti of Italian meats, cheeses and olives. During the second act comes the second course of a Caesar salad and minestrone soup. As the plot thickens in the third act, so does the third course of regular pasta or zucchini “pasta” curls topped with marinara, pesto or Alfredo Italian flag sauce served with herb-stuffed rolled pork loin. Finally, served during the final act will be a dessert of tiramisu.

Join us for an evening of fun as intrepid reporter, part-time detective and full-time Sea Rancher Steve Oakwood once again collects the facts and solves the case of what happened that night.

Like many good dinner-mystery theaters, the audience participates. The play is in four scenes. The dinner is in four courses. In between scenes, the dinner courses are served. While enjoying the courses, each table of diners tries to solve the mystery and win the prize!

Food for thought, but also food for the detective of delicious dishes.