La Cena Criminal

A murder-mystery dinner set in Paris in 1958, in which guests try to solve a murder over dinner at Restaurante Torre de Reixes in Alicante.

La Cena Criminal combines a dinner with a performance of police theatre in which the audience takes part in the plot. Each person may simply follow the case from their table or take on an active role, as a suspect or as an investigator, gathering clues and uncovering twists that change the course of the story throughout the night.

The action takes place in post-war Paris. At the Louvre, art historian Valérie La Voyante gathers several guests for a reception with champagne and appetisers served by waiters in waistcoats and ties, and the gathering ends with the discovery of a corpse. From that moment on, the diners must question one another, compare their accounts and piece together the clues to the crime as the courses are served.

The format originated in England in the early twentieth century as a murder mystery game, and over time theatre groups and restaurants in various countries adopted it. In Alicante it is staged at the Restaurante Torre de Reixes, where the dinner and the plot unfold in the same room.