After 37 years of cabaret dining, Melbourne’s iconic Dracula’s restaurant is nailing the coffin shut. A statement on the restaurant’s Facebook page says: “We are seeing the demand for our style of live entertainment in the region we offer has diminished in recent years despite our earnest efforts to maintain our popularity.” The page has subsequently been flooded with messages from upset fans.

The vampire-themed cabaret restaurant first opened in 1980 inside a warehouse down Drewery Lane in the CBD. In the beginning it was modelled on The Rocky Horror Picture Show and featured a “haunted castle” interior. It moved to its current location on Victoria Street in 1990, where it morphed into its current vampire-themed incarnation.