Jean Anne Kain, a well-known Columbia musical performer and dinner theater pioneer, died Nov. 25, 2009, from a stroke in her Ellicott City home.

Mrs. Kain, 74, was a mother of five, grandmother of five and great-grandmother of two, but was famous from Virginia to Pennsylvania for her star turns in "Hello, Dolly!" and "Mame," both of which became signature roles.

In a 30-year theatrical career, she played most of the great female roles of the musical stage, from "The King and I" and "Gypsy" to critically acclaimed performances in "Sweeney Todd" and "Follies."

A native of Queens, N.Y., she started out as a vocalist in the waning years of the big bands, leading to parts in Long Island summer stock. Stationed in the Far East with her military husband in the mid-1960s, she developed a one-woman cabaret act for the USO and hosted television and radio programs for Armed Forces Radio.

"I was sort of an out-of-the way Dinah Shore," she said in an interview with the Howard County Times in June 1987.

After settling outside Washington, D.C., she played Maria in "West Side Story" with the American Light Opera Company. A friend and co-star named John Kinnamon approached her to help him start the first dinner theater in Maryland. Kain became the first general manager of the new Burn Brae Dinner Theatre, in Burtonsville, upon its opening in 1968.

"Sometimes the food wouldn't show up, or they'd run out," she recalled of those early days. "Nearly every evening we'd have to apologize before the show for people not getting any food. It was dreadful."

Mrs. Kain also helped Kinnamon found the Colony 7 Dinner Theater, in Annapolis Junction, and to mount shows for other local stages. She loved the management side of theater and working behind the scenes, she said, "but performing always won out."

After moving to the Simpsonville area of Howard County, she starred in the first musical presented at the Petrucci's Dinner Theatre in Laurel, playing opposite Bob Brenner in "I Do! I Do!"

One of her directors at Burn Brae, Toby Orenstein, asked Mrs. Kain to help her start her own dinner theater in Columbia in early 1980. When it was ready to open its doors, Mrs. Kain starred in the inaugural full-scale production at Toby's Dinner Theatre of "Hello, Dolly!"

Starring roles continued and led to the artistic high of playing Mrs. Lovett at Toby's in the first dinner theater staging of Stephen Sondheim's "Sweeney Todd" in 1983. She would perform for another decade while working as group sales manager at Toby's.

Mrs. Kain came out of semi-retirement in 1999 to play the poignant supporting role in Stephen Sondheim's "Follies" of an aging New York showgirl still coming to terms with her glorious showbiz heyday.

She was preceded in death by her husband, Eugene Kain. She is survived by her sister, Mary Ellen Husslein; her children, Donna Jean Kain, Richard Kain, Maureen Stang, David Kain and Steven Kain; grandchildren, Cameron Stang, Nicole Kain-Lorsong, Sean Kain, Chris Stang and Heather Bumgardner; and two great-grandchildren.

Funeral services were held Nov. 30, 2009. Donations can be made to: To Write Love On Her Arms at www.twloha.com.

(This story has been updated.)

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