Medieval Times Dinner and Tournament is a family dinner theater featuring staged medieval-style games, sword-fighting, and jousting performed by a cast of 75 actors and 20 horses. Each location is housed in a replica 11th-century castle, with the exception of the Toronto location, which is housed inside a Beaux-Arts structure built in 1912.
The chain is located in Buena Park, California; Dallas, Texas; Chicago, Illinois; Lyndhurst, New Jersey; Hanover, Maryland; Myrtle Beach, South Carolina; Atlanta, Georgia; Orlando, Florida and Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Medieval Times Entertainment, the holding company for the nine theaters, is headquartered in Irving, Texas.
The chain was featured in the 1996 film The Cable Guy, and the 2004 feature film Garden State. It has also been featured in episodes of TV shows such as Cake Boss, Hell's Kitchen and Celebrity Apprentice.
In April 1997, Medieval Times' owners sought bankruptcy protection after losing a court battle to the Internal Revenue Service that required the Buena Park location to pay $7.5 million and the Kissimmee location to pay $2.5 million in back taxes. According to the IRS, Medieval Times improperly deducted royalties, loan interest and management fees in the 1987 and 1989 tax years. When asked why the company was filing for bankruptcy the company’s bankruptcy lawyer, Alan Friedman, said, "one of the primary reasons for filing was to prevent the IRS from beginning to seize any assets."
In October 2011, Medieval Times began an update of its shows in the Dallas location. Starting May 22, 2012, the Myrtle Beach location introduced the changes, the sixth location to do so. "Knights of the Realm" still has an 11th century setting, but the music, recorded in Kiev, Ukraine, mixes an orchestra and show choir with "electric guitars and rock percussion", with "a Russian feel". The score is the third to use Daniel May. Shows change every four years.
Famous quotes containing the words medieval and/or times:
“The medieval university looked backwards; it professed to be a storehouse of old knowledge.... The modern university looks forward, and is a factory of new knowledge.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895)
“He rides in the Row at ten o’clock in the morning, goes to the Opera three times a week, changes his clothes at least five times a day, and dines out every night of the season. You don’t call that leading an idle life, do you?”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)