Dinner at eight

When George Cukor directed Dinner at Eight in 1933, he had at his disposal a cast including nearly a dozen of the biggest Hollywood stars of the era. The dinner that gives the film its title is the moment toward which everything builds, the preparation for it a staging of life itself. The eponymous table’s circular geometry, divided into segments, forms a dodecahedron that invites celebration of the seating arrangement, as it guides each diner with graphic precision. The triangular, radiating sections of the tabletop, with their carefully crafted veneers, converge on the center as if reinforcing unity, dialogue, and shared conviviality. The tabletop is supported by a sophisticated interplay of vertically folded panels, which draw toward the table’s core while at the same time expanding outward, creating a play of light and shadow. The delicately contoured panels are finished in leather and edged with solid wood—elements that enrich the table’s presence with a measured elegance.