Audience Reviews

AUDIENCE REVIEW: "Dinner Party Project" Choreographed by Michelle Thompson

Company:
Michelle Thompson

Performance Date:
September 18 - 21, 2025

Freeform Review:

September 18–21 @ 3am Theater, Astoria, Queens

Imagine having an omniscient vantage point at a Saturday night dinner party, fully aware of all the little moments that unfolded between each couple before they knocked on the door.

Dinner Party Project blends some of New York’s most dynamic art forms: dance, acting, playwriting and music into one compelling multidisciplinary work. This work explores modern relationships and what comes with them; the doubts, challenges, and quiet negotiations that live beneath the surface of partnership.

Creative director, choreographer, and producer Michelle Thompson continues her deep investigation into the duet form, exploring what's revealed when conversations are captured through movement. In this work, Thompson and dancers collaborated with playwrights to create scenes that Scott Illingworth of Society Theatre Company helped to shape. Michael Wall (composer) and Jose Sebastian Alberdi, Emily Zemba, Padraic Lillis, Brendan George (playwrights) all contributed to the driving soundscape of this performance, bringing a sharp insight and intimacy to each exchange.

SAGE: "But you promise? They know I’m coming? They’re okay with it?"
ALEX: "I told them I was bringing someone, yeah."

A pacing conversation in an apartment — a typical evening, suddenly unsettled. Over the course of the night, five couples face five pivotal moments. The audience becomes a fly on the wall, drawn into each private exchange. You’ll see their quirks, their charms, and their very real vulnerabilities (that you will absolutely adore).

This is a work where choreography does not simply pantomime the text, and where the text does not merely caption the choreography. Instead, each gesture, glance, and phrase speaks a shared language. You find yourself reading between what is said and what is done. Subtle nuances of care, intimacy, and vulnerability weave themselves through every word and gesture, disclosing a second language that perhaps only dance can speak. Subtext becomes visible. Stillness carries weight. What isn’t said becomes the loudest thing in the room. The work uncovers the corners of connection, capturing the dance of being together. In the end, you’ll see what these couples bring to the table, and what (or who) they may bring home with them.

Author:
Alexandra DiCastro

Website:
https://www.dinnerpartyprojectnyc.com

Photo Credit:
Photo: Layla Shoo