In Donovan & Calderón’s latest work, The Reception, the audience is a voyeur at a lively social gathering. Popular music, fizzy drinks, and friendly chatter hit the marks of a playful party, but something’s not quite right. Bit by bit, The Reception depicts an uncanny cracking at the seams, as the revelers contend with an increasingly unanchored world. Created and performed with a guest list of New York dance-world luminaries that spans the decades, The Reception delves into the dark underbelly of how we socialize and entertain.

Ya know at a party, when it seems like it’s all coordinated by an act of God? Or at least choreographed by a real professional? The Reception, a choreo-drama created by Sean Donovan and Sebastián Calderón Bentin all about the feeling of a party, is a bit of comedy, a bit of structuralist pornography, and a bit of divine intervention — clearly some higher power had a part in this process and at their rehearsals. The minutia of the play is where all the fun is and where all the rigor lives. The Reception is a work about how at a party, it seems like the lights always focus on the drinks table when the cool kids stand around there, and it seems like the repetition was planned within a larger, thoughtful structure, and it seems like the drama is written in Hollywood by some big shot. It’s less like a play and less like a dance but more like Squat Theatre performance that impresses and overwhelms you. All the while, there are performers working, sweating, hitting marks, focusing together, and really, it is the performers, the party goers, that we are there to see. While all five deserve a Gatorade and recognition, two performers, Hannah Heller and Ishmael Houston-Jones, particularly sto …Read more