The Dinner Detective True Crime Murder Mystery Dinner Show - Northern Chicago Suburbs, IL — Local services in Elk Grove Township

UPDATE: I received an email from the organizer regarding my experience (I had reached out via their website after the show) with an apology for the food experience and an offer to refund the tickets, which was accepted and appreciated.

The star rating was updated due to the fact that they made it right and because of the two main performers, who are what made the show enjoyable. They were fun to watch.

We went to the dinner show tonight on Saturday, 4/27/24, and it was a genuinely awful experience.

The two main performers (the detectives) were funny if a bit cheesy. But overall, they kept the show moving along and worked well with the crowd to improv throughout the night.

The food and service is where it fell apart and led to the 1-star rating. My meal came out 15 minutes after all other meals and was still frozen. It was the eggplant option and, in case aren’t aware, you select your dinner entree when you buy your tickets (not day of or after you are seated), which for our group was two months before the show.

To make it worse, when we brought this up to the show's on-site manager/coordinator, she and the hotel's catering manager did next to nothing. No one offered to bring out a new, fully-cooked meal, or cook the frozen food in front of me, or refund my ticket price. The catering manager offered free breakfast vouchers for our group, to be used another time. How does that help then and there?

When I asked the show coordinator about a refund, she said that the office was closed (fair enough - it's Saturday night), that it'd be open on Monday and that she'd write down the contact information of who I should speak with about a refund, but that she 'couldn't make any promises'. The contact information was never even given to me.

And after all that, no one cleared the dinner plate, so it sat in front of me for the rest of the show (about 90 minutes). This was after they brought the desserts out (I wasn’t at the table at that time because I was trying to resolve the situation with the show coordinator). We left early while the guesses as to who the killer was were being counted.

I would not recommend this show. While I didn't think the food would be great, I was surprised that no one wanted to do anything about a mostly frozen meal being served. They were just fine with a...

We had a large group of 16 seniors from Luther Village who attended the show on Saturday night November 6th in a meeting room at the Marriott Schaumburg. The residents were unable to hear the actors due to an inadequate sound system and actors wearing masks due to Covid - 19. The actors in the murder mystery shared with the group that they had not been vaccinated so they had to wear masks at all times. The actors are interacting closely with the guests so they should absolutely be vaccinated to risk putting the paying guests in harms way. The food was at best lukewarm and the visual appeal and flavors left much to be desired. Our group was unable to get coffee or iced tea which is supposed to be part of the dinner package according to the ads online. The event was so bad the 16 residents of our community opted to leave before the murderer was identified. We will never again take residents to one of these events which was a complete disappointment Take some time to fix the sound issues, food quality and service problems. Last but not least serve coffee with dessert instead of making it seem like you do not understand English to avoid the problem. Based on our experience for the price of the show it should have been...

The show was not what we were expecting. It was not an entertainment show but a very low budget, (at times off color) HIGHLY dependent on the participation of the paying customer. The facility was a rundown hotel. The lady at the front desk didn’t even know there was a murder mystery event happening and was no help in directions.

The food was terrible. My chicken was cold and so tough it was hard to cut. My husband’s salmon was at least warm but the potatoes were cold. The dessert cake’s flavor was unable to be identified by our group at the table. The two detective actors were amateurs at the best descriptions. We left early and felt relieved to get out. The heat of a July, Chicago, humid evening was delightful after the room’s (we had been in for the last 1.5hrs) air conditioning was not working. As the detective actor said “it’s hotter than the surface of the sun in here”. Please save your time and money and DO NOT go to...