Due to some awesome scheduling, I was lucky enough to have both Mackenzie and Jeremy join me for Round Three of the NYC murder mystery tour last weekend! We decided on The Killing Kompany, because it’s one that I hear the most about.

I have to admit, when I went to their website to purchase tickets, I was a little apprehensive. It was terribly difficult to navigate, plus it just doesn’t look good. That may be a superficial criticism, but I just feel don’t feel as comfortable using a website that looks sketchy. Anyway, tickets were $45 per person, so that was fine. It was also advertised that the show will include dancing, but no details were given as to whether or not it’s part of the performance, or if it happens afterwards.

The three of us set out to Riccardo’s in Astoria anticipating another fun murder mystery in NYC. We pulled up to the venue, which turned out to be a banquet or a catering hall. It wasn’t exactly what we were expecting, so that threw us off a little. But there were plenty of people around and we followed them inside ready to solve a crime!

We were seated at a small table and saw that there was a buffet set up for dinner. It had the usual banquet/buffet food and I have to say, it was totally unimpressive. When it came time to eat we agreed that none of it had much flavor and it was all pretty boring. The food was perhaps the most disappointing, but sadly, it wasn’t the only disappointing thing.

It was advertised as “comedy murder mystery” and was definitely heavy on the comedy. Some of the jokes were actually funny, but it felt somewhat disjointed and the murder mystery wasn’t all that interesting. I would’ve loved a more cohesive experience, but it wasn’t bad overall. There were parts of it that the three of us really enjoyed, like the actors were very into their roles and there were some jokes that literally had us laughing out loud. A big plus was when the detective came over to our table and pointed out how suspicious Jeremy looked. HA!

There was an awards ceremony at the end to recognize certain audience members, and I thought that was a cute idea and a way to keep the audience energized until the very last second. And then, at the end of the night, the dancing came in. We stuck around long enough to see what it was, but we didn’t partake. It could be a fun thing for a couple on a date to do to round out the evening, but it’s not something we felt we needed to do.

Upon further research after the show, it appears that this company rarely performs the same script twice, at least at the same locations in NYC, which is nice for anyone who would want to attend on a somewhat regular basis.

We had a good time overall, but it felt pretty average in most respects. However, the dancing at the end was a nice addition, though it wasn’t particularly murder-mystery-y. We did like that there was a bit more audience interaction than we’d seen before, but the food wasn’t the best and the mystery wasn’t as exciting as we were hoping for. But there are so many options for NYC murder mystery shows, so each company has a lot of competition.