Celebrity Traitors. It’s the TV show of the moment. Whether you’re glued to it, lusting after Claudia Winkleman’s outfits or loudly insisting how much better you’d be at ousting traitors, you can’t really miss it.
We’re big fans here at BOTI Towers so when we received an invitation to take part in a Traitors-style ‘Imposters Dinner Experience’ (keeps the trademark police happy), we leapt at the chance. (It was a bit of a Traitors-themed month as it followed on from a fabulous Traitors-themed dinner at No No Please for their OctoberBest offering. More, please!)
Adventure Connections and Office Christmas‘ invitation to “an evening of bubbles, betrayal and fine-dining” didn’t give much away, keeping us guessing right to the last minute. Would we be chosen to be a faithful or a traitor? What if it was all an elaborate scam to gather a group of journalists in one place and off them? How annoying would the other people be? We had a lot of questions.
Finding the venue
Our first ‘task’ started before we even arrived – finding the venue. Like the Brighton insiders we think we are, we headed straight for the Royal Pavilion without even checking the address, firmly believing the Brighton Pavilion Gatehouse to be the little building to the side of Brighton’s own Taj Mahal-esque palace. When the staff assured us this didn’t exist, we thought they were just playing and that this was all part of the task. Only the true faithfuls would make it through, right? Wrong. Eventually one of us had the bright idea to actually check the Google Maps link we’d been sent and quickly realised our error.
Duly humbled, we made our way over to the actual Gatehouse, a sprawling townhouse that sleeps up to 32 people, that looks over the Prince Regent’s palace. The Gatehouse is managed by Adventure Connections, who teamed up with immersive party pros West End Events for the experience, to give us a preview of the Imposters Christmas Parties they’re running in December.
On arrival, we were welcomed into a dimly lit red-hued room packed with strangers (potential traitors, sorry, imposters?) and given a welcome glass of bubbly. The buzz was instant – no-one knew quite what to expect.
Meeting ‘Claudia’
We were swiftly introduced to our Claudia Winkleman for the evening – Paris – less full of fringe and orange of make-up, but extremely entertaining. With help from his cloaked-up sidekick, he explained how the evening would unfold before we were summoned, one by one, into the long smoke-filled dining room where we would open a scroll that would decide our fate.
We were both faithfuls, so our conviction that we’d definitely manage to hoodwink people as traitors will remain unchallenged (for now). We threw ourselves into the social sleuthing with abandon, watching the table like hawks. Who kept glancing at the host? Who went quiet at the wrong moment? Who laughed too breezily when nothing was funny? Imposter!
Sleuthing, side-eyes and suspicious strangers
It’s a similar concept to the TV show: find the imposters and avoid getting murdered, while taking part in some fun dinner table tasks and enjoying a three-course meal. Mutual paranoia is surprisingly bonding.
Our first – and arguably hardest – task? Naming the team. We conceded defeat to Table 1 with this one with their inspired ‘Slayters’ name.
We don’t want to give the game away, but suffice to say the tasks were extremely fun – and absolutely didn’t involve any grave-digging. It’s a rare thing to be able to get a group of strangers all laughing their heads off within minutes. One of the quests even helped us establish that at least five of our table had had an illicit outdoor wee at The Big Chill festival. Ice officially broken.
But, tiny violins at the ready: one of us was murdered and the other falsely (sob) outed as a traitor in quick succession (we won’t spoil the actual murdering process). Fortunately, mere death didn’t stand in the way of us continuing to take part in the tasks or prevent us enjoying the excellent meal and copious amounts of drink. It’s almost like they knew journalists were coming.
The feasting
In between all the tasks, murdering and (false!) accusations, we tucked into our pre-ordered menu created by private chef service Dine Indulge. We’d opted for the vegetarian offering: a flavour-packed garlic mushroom medley in a creamy pepper and paprika sauce, followed by feta and walnut-stuffed hasselback butternut squash served with a zingy carrot and orange puree, and a seriously decadent treacle tart with a caramelised pecan crust and clotted cream to finish.
The final reveal of the duplicitous traitors was as hilarious as the rest of the evening. We may now have trust issues, but one thing’s for sure: being murdered’s never been so much fun.
If you fancy trying it for yourself – and also finding out that it’s way harder but even more fun than it seems – you can book yourself onto one of West End Events’ Imposters Christmas Parties in London this December (4th, 5th, 11th and 12th December; from £125 per person).