Finding a Connection in a New York Dance Group for Seniors

It was Thanksgiving Eve, and I had no one to spend it with. No American had invited me over, and no fellow expat had welcomed me in for a warm meal. The few people I’ve met since I arrived in New York were either busy with friends or buried in schoolwork. I felt a deep sadness, the kind that comes when you feel like you belong neither here nor there. How silly, I thought. Since when did I care about Thanksgiving?

After six years of living abroad, I’d learned that building community takes time. In every city I spent time in, I’d eventually found people who turned foreign places into home. But five months into New York, I still didn’t have a single friend.

For weeks, I’d been exploring the idea of making my thesis film about loneliness. The thought first came to me on Halloween, another night spent alone. As a journalist, I couldn’t just sit with my solitude. I needed to understand it. In a city of over 8 million, who else felt this way?

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I researched the “loneliness epidemic,” spoke to experts, and re-watched films by Sofia Coppola and Wong Kar-wai. But I still didn’t know what I truly wanted to say, until I came across a local newspaper article titled, “Dance Leader Helps Seniors Combat Loneliness and Stay Fit.”

Intrigued, I reached out to the nonprofit at the center of it, Dances for a Variable Population (DVP). Days later, I was attending the group's free classes in parks and senior centers.

One Sunday after class on the Upper West Side, a woman named Chris O’Sullivan introduced herself. “I have incurable cancer,” she said in a soft voice. “I joined the dance group to get out and feel better.” I wrote her words down. That’s how the documentary short film Revival began.

My co-director, Nicola Sitch, and I started following Chris around the city, grabbing coffee, attending protests and doctor’s appointments, but above all, dancing. Sometimes she asked us to turn the camera off. But through trust and open conversations, we filmed all the way to a trip she took to Martha’s Vineyard, capturing deeply personal moments.

She turned 78 on our last day of filming. She blew out her candles, not knowing how much time she had left, but surrounded by a chosen community that, like her, had decided to live fully until the end.

Over time, we realized Revival wasn’t about dance or illness. It was about people who refuse to give up on life. Those classes showed us how much this city needs spaces that foster connection and creativity. They also reminded us how urgently the arts need support, especially as funding continues to disappear.

In two weeks, I’ll leave New York for good. On my last day, Nicola and I will have lunch with Chris, our new friend.