Blue Moon keeps a good thing going with 'Howard Johnson's'
You know things are going well for your dinner theater comedy when the dinner plates are coming back to the kitchen empty and the patron comments include things like: “Thanks for the intermission; I needed a break from laughing.” 
So it’s gone for Blue Moon Dinner Theatre’s “Murder at the Howard Johnson’s,” which plays this weekend, April 16-17, and has extended its run through next weekend due to such good attendance. The play, written by Ron Clark and Sam Bobrick, opened in late March at Blue Moon, 215 E. Main St., and has been a big hit, director Thomas Townsend said.
“We were actually sold out for the first half of our run, so we’ve added a weekend. Audiences are loving it. They laugh the entire time.”
The play stars Bradley Foster Smith, Stephanie Sherwood and Tod C. Riddle, all Blue Moon veterans, who form a comedic love triangle. A married woman, Arlene, and another man, Mitchell, plot to murder her husband, Paul, but when she finds out Mitchell has been unfaithful to her, she then conspires with her husband to kill Mitchell. This leads to further plotting and confusion.
“We knew it was funny, but I think we also got just the right chemistry with the cast and direction and the right time of year,” Townsend said. “Everything came together for a perfect laugh storm.
“We’re fortunate this cast is three professionally trained actors. They could easily be working at one of the major professional theaters in the region.”
The biggest challenge for this production, he added, “was coming up with the correct combination of Howard Johnson colors, to look like an actual hotel room in a 1980s Howard Johnson’s Motor Inn.”
The play is rated PG-13 for adult situations. A five-piece gourmet dinner (Polynesian chicken) is served at 6 p.m. with the show at 7:30. Cost is $39.99 plus tax.
Shows are Friday and Saturday night as well as April 23-24.
Blue Moon is also offering show-and-dessert and show-only tickets at reduced rates. The dessert is a warm turtle brownie sundae, which is a brownie topped with ice cream, caramel, chocolate and toffee.
For more information, call 232-1350 or visit www.bluemoondinnertheatre.com.
“So far we’ve had two home runs this season with ‘Last of the Red Hot Lovers’ and this one,” Townsend said. “Our next one, ‘Noises Off,’ opens May 15. The comedies are paying off.”
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