Desert Star Theater

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Desert Star Theater is a dinner theater establishment in Murray, Utah. It started out as a small theater called the Gem, which showed silent movies with a piano for music. It was later closed down and demolished, but rebuilt and expanded into the Iris Theater by owner Tony Duvall. After his retirement, the Iris changed hands several times before being renamed the Vista.

The theater first became Desert Star when Mike and Alyce Todd attempted to produce a play near This Is The Place Heritage Park. This play was the first to exhibit the common traits found today in Desert Star plays. After the summer ended, they attempted to find an indoor location for their plays. They considered the closed down Vista, and eventually took it and renamed it the Desert Star Playhouse.

In 2000, after several successful plays, the city of Murray said that the building had to be brought up to code or torn down. The owner wanted to go with the latter, but the Todds decided to buy the theater and renovate. Today, the playhouse features Dinner and Cabaret theaters, as well as performing two shows in different theaters.

Desert Star is known for parody plays, doing comedic spoofs of classic movies and stories. They are also known for political jokes, and their themes tend to revolve around Utah. Each show also ends with a musical olio, in which the performers dress up in various costumes and do musical numbers.

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