Restaurant Rues Cult Connection

It’s not the kind of publicity that a chief executive officer likes to get.

But Marie Callender Pie Shops Inc. got a dollop of unwanted media attention last week when word surfaced that the now-infamous Heaven’s Gate group had conducted a last supper of sorts at one of the Orange-based company’s restaurants.

Shortly after the group’s mass suicide, television crews descended upon the chain’s Carlsbad location to film the site where, just days earlier, black-clad members of the cult had appeared for dinner.

“It’s weird,” said Marie Callender Pie Shops Chief Executive Officer Leonard H. Dreyer, who learned of the connection in a frantic telephone call from the restaurant’s franchisee.

Was there some cosmic significance to cult members’ decision to patronize the restaurant? “We don’t know why they were there,” other than to eat, Dreyer said.

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Greg Johnson covers retail businesses and restaurants for The Times. He can be reached at (714) 966-5950 and at greg.johnson@latimes.com.