Day 29: Vampirates at Pirates Dinner Adventure

Austin Moore: My name is Austin Moore, and I am Show Director and Benjamin Blue.

Madeline Ellingson: I am Madeline Ellingson, and tonight I played Princess Anita, but I also play the Mermaid and Treasure.

Austin Moore: Vampirates is a special event that we like to do throughout the month of October, we are taking our little show of Pirates Dinner Adventure and giving it a slight twist by turning the whole crew into vampires. It's a great little adventure with some slight twists, slightly different from our normal story. We'll still get the same nice entertaining aspect of interacting with the crowd, have a nice little comedy moment with some kids, and doing all that, but with a nice little Halloween twist to it.

Elsie: Is this the first year?

Austin Moore: This is not the first year, we've done it for a few years now of different versions of the Vampirates story. This is the first year that we're doing the almost normal story with the slight little vampire twist. We've done other stories though in the past with vampires.

Elsie: Can you tell us about the costumes? 

Austin Moore: That's better your department, since you wear more than actual costume costume.

Madeline Ellingson: Yeah, of course. The costumes, which are fairly similar to Florida, there's a Pirates Dinner Adventure in Orlando, FL. We got the classic corset, which is of the time period, and I turn into a pirate princess, but I do have the classic, you know, Elizabeth Swann dress at the beginning of the show. Then, of course, the men are dressed up as your, you know, pirate with their boots and their spats.

Austin Moore: We do a little trick with our boots, since we can't wear actual boots on stage since we're doing stunts, we were usually like wrestling shoes with horse riding spats, and it gives the illusion of boots from far away.

Elsie: So why make a show like this?

Madeline Ellingson: I would say a show like this is just so... Well, for one, it fits so well on this boulevard, on Beach Blvd, you got, Medieval Times and Knott's Berry Farm. I think this show just fits so well with that family aspect that Buena Park is trying to produce that it is the land of yes, as they say. It's just so important for the whole family to come to together, it is so interactive, I think, compared to some of the other shows offered here. So, it can truly be so much more engaging with your kids, and there's still some jokes thrown in there that some older people might get and not the kids as much. So, it's just like so much more encompassing, so much more engaging and inviting and welcoming for the whole family.

Austin Moore: Yeah, it's a great show. I mean, how often do you get a chance to walk on board a pirate ship and meet other pirates with your kids? So, it really is just a great show to bring with the family and to escape from some of the daily stress in the world, like going to the movies, but you get to see it in real life with real people.

Elsie: With dinner.

Austin Moore: Yeah, with dinner involved.

Elsie: What do you want to make the audience feel with this show?

Austin Moore: If they ever collected and just tell me that they were just so entertained all the time and it was just a great little stress relief to just come in and have some fun and laughs, that's usually what sends me home with a little smile.

Madeline Ellingson: Just for me it is, I'm always hoping that the kids were truly engaged. It can sometimes be a little of a longer show and so if I can come out of that with the kids being like, "oh my gosh, that was so much fun. I really loved you. I supported you!" Or maybe they supported one of the pirates, but it's just it's so much fun how excited they get about this, about theater, and it's a great introduction to theater, too.

Austin Moore: I had a kid the other day who was about five years old who asked when he turned 18 if he could audition here, so we'll see him in a few years.

Elsie: Why is it important to keep Vampirates different from the other shows?

Austin Moore: I think a lot of times we have quite a few regulars here who like to come here with their families several times, for their parties, and whenever we change the show slightly they get to see a new experience, and they always come to us at the end and tell us how much fun they had seeing the same performers and stuff, and doing that different storyline it kept them guessing and they didn't know what was going to happen. So, it's great to change that story for our returners to come and see something new.

Elsie: How is demand so far?

Austin Moore: Last year when we came back from COVID we were unfortunately not able to do Vampirates, and we had a lot of people coming up to us asking if it was coming or not, and unfortunately, we couldn't do it with the short rehearsal time. So, this year when we announced we come back, we've definitely seen a lot of feedback on social media, like people excited, and reposting the story. So, there's been very positive demand for us coming back.

Elsie: What do you see Vampirates evolving into?

Madeline Ellingson: Vampirates?

Austin Moore: Yeah, Vampirates or Pirates Dinner Adventure?

Elsie: Either. 

Madeline Ellingson: Well, I would hope that it encourages the audience to want to return because it could be a new show, because it could be something different and something fun and exciting, and I would hope that that is where Vampirates and pirates could go in the future.

Austin Moore: It'd be great to always just constantly reinvent the show and adding new stunts, new story elements, just always keep the guest surprise and waiting.

Elsie: Well, great. Thank you so much. The show was great, dinner was great, and I had so much fun.