Mystery Mixers

About Us

We do murder mystery parties for groups of 35-70 people where all of the guests all play characters. This is not the typical murder mystery dinner show. It is an interactive mixing-mingling party that is unlike anything else in Central Florida.

Many years ago, when I was a crime reporter for the Tampa Tribune, I was invited to a small dinner party for eight people, where each guest received their character information in advance and came in costume. It was a game in a box that included a little cutout body you placed on the floor and some other silly stuff. But everybody realized playing characters was a blast.

The problem was that there were only three mysteries in the box, and once we did them, that was it. Since I was a professional writer who covered crime for a living, my friends challenged me to create my own murder mystery party. So I decided I would give it a shot. But I couldn’t keep it to eight characters – I wanted my main characters to have sidekicks, plus I imagined other characters I wanted to attend. My first draft had 16 characters. So, I invited 16 friends, and we had a lot of fun. Then I put it away and didn’t think about it anymore.

about mystery mixer, the dinner theater option for groups wanting to mix and mingle.
About six months later, I ran into somebody who said they had heard about the party I had done. They had 25 people and asked me to do one for them. So, I added a few more characters. Over the next five years, I did two or three parties a year just for laughs. The parties kept growing, and eventually I decided to turn it into a little side business. I was doing three or four parties a year.

I moved from journalism into public relations and held several high-profile positions, including Press Secretary to the Speaker of the Florida House of Representatives and Director of Communications for the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice. So I was very busy. But even though I wasn’t doing any marketing for the parties, people still heard about them and kept asking me to do them.

Opportunities kept popping up. I’ve done a Rock and Roll Party on a cruise to Nova Scotia, been sent to Key West to do a pirate party on a large party boat and had many other epic adventures.

The side benefit is that I get to create an event where people laugh – a lot. I have had people come up to me who did one of my parties 10 years ago, and they still remember what character they played and how much they laughed.

I couldn’t believe people would pay me to have a good time – plus, of course, there is something very special about making up characters out of thin air and then watching somebody take my vision and make that character come to life.

Finally, in September of 2025, I was able to realize my dream of doing my murder mystery parties full-time. I have now created more than 600 characters, and they have all walked in the door and said hello to me. How cool is that? What more could you ask for from life?

(By Tom Denham, Mystery Mixers Creator and CEO.)