My Dream Dinner Party
Imagine being able to host your dream dinner party, bringing together a group of extraordinary people into your home. But there's a twist. None of your guests are alive. Instead they're all brought back to life from beyond the grave through the wonders of the BBC Radio archive – and edited together beautifully as though you're all eating, drinking and talking together around a single table.
Our “hosts” include:
Minnie Driver
Suggs
Simon Callow
David Baddiel
Sophie Ellis-Bextor
Joan Bakewell
Sir Simon Schama
Jack Whitehall
Alison Steadman
John Cleese
Shappi Khorsandi
Jane Horrocks
Sally Phillips
Howard Jacobson
Omid Djalli
Ed Balls
What the hosts had to say...
Jane Horrocks:"It's wonderful...I think the conversation between Ian (Dury) and myself has a real intimacy to it. A beautiful opportunity to speak again to that person....in fact it made me feel he was still alive in a very profound way. It really sounds like we’re all there together. Very touching at the end. Thank you so much"
Sally Phillips:"I wanted to thank you for having done such an amazing job.....You made a really beautiful thing. Exceptional editing and impressive research. Hope (and expect) you to win absolutely every award going. Thank you for making me look so good!"
Shappi Khorsandi:"This was an incredibly special programme to be a part of. Quite unlike anything I had done before. The care and compassion the producers gave to all the dead dinner guests was touching and when I heard the final cut it was, thanks to them, full of heart"
What others have said...
Since the first dream dinner party back in 2016, hosted by Ed Balls, Tuning Fork has gone on to win a BBC Radio award and received some great reviews.
The Radio Times said the stars of this brilliantly crafted series, are the researchers who pull together the archive clips that form a “coherent, believable and often humorous narrative”.
The Daily Mail said Princess Margaret, Orson Welles, Christopher Hitchens and Barry Humphries all chat and interact over dinner, “their voices brilliantly edited and intercut from the radio archives”.
The Spectator said the notion of a dream dinner party had been “triumphantly revamped for the digital age”
The Daily Telegraph's Gillian Reynolds hailed the series as “a delicious confection”.
Woman's Hour presenter Jane Garvey said the programmes were “a complete delight...you gasp in admiration. It's genuinely a work of art.”
Steve Wright said live on Radio 2 that “this is an amazing show...genius. I love it”
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.. and again Steve reminds his listeners with a small sample of the show this time.
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Radio 4: Feedback
Dream Dinner Party has also been featured twice on Radio 4's Feedback.
Here, an interview with producers Sarah Peters and Peregrine Andrews on the making of the programme. Start listening at 22'01” https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0b6phmc
And here, a piece about the use of archives in BBC Radio 4 programmes, including an interview with Sarah Peters. Start listening at 17'15” (to 24'45”) https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0001p76