LEWISTON — Marco’s Restaurant will host two evenings of dinner theater entertainment this fall season.

Mainely Improv, a Maine-based improvisational comedy troupe, will return for an evening of fun on Saturday, Oct. 16. Then on Saturday, Nov. 6, Mystery for Hire will present “Zelda and Zoe’s Spirits of Suspicion.”

“We launched our improv comedy dinner theater over a year ago with great reviews,” said Dan Marois, who, with his wife, Denise, owns and operates both theater troupes.

Much in the style of TV’s “Whose Line Is It, Anyway?,” Mainely Improv performs on-the-spot comic skits based entirely on suggestions from the audience.

“When the show starts, we have no idea what we will do during the course of the evening,” Marois said. “Our challenge is to take situations and characters suggested by the audience and put them in outrageous situations. It is great fun since the audience sets the direction for the evening.”

While the cast varies, Mainely Improv is made up of a core group of performers: Chuck Waterman of Gorham, Julie Poulin of Monmouth, Brian Files of Gardiner, Katie Marois of Poland Spring and Dan Marois.

“ ‘Zelda and Zoe’s Spirits of Suspicion’ takes the audience through an evening of mysterious, mystical and magical fun, compliments of two psychic sisters with questionable abilities,” Marois said. “There’s lots of interesting happenings as the sisters journey into the world of psychic phenomena.”

Mystery for Hire actors perform during the breaks of a four-course meal as they present strange characters and fast action leading to a mystery. Audience members are encouraged to take notes and write down clues during the show. At the end of the performance, the audience is invited to guess whodunit.

Tickets for the improv and mystery show are $36.95 per person, which includes the show, buffet, tax and gratuity. A cash bar is available.

Doors open at 6:15 p.m. and the show starts at 7 p.m. Reservations for both shows can be made by calling 783-0336.

Mainely Improv and Mystery for Hire will return to Marco’s Restaurant in Lewiston this fall to give dinner-theater presentations.  Performers, from left, are Brian Files of Gardiner, Anne McVeigh-Morin of Biddeford, Dan Marois of Poland Spring, Denise Marois of Poland Spring and Chuck Waterman of Gorham.