A Pajama Party to Pep Up Your Small Talk

By Sheila Yasmin Marikar

Small talk: anchor of polite society, or rot in need of rooting out? "At dinner parties, oftentimes, the conversation is really surface," Ashley Merrill, a founder of a card game called the Deep, said the other day. She sat at a dining table in her glass-walled house in Santa Monica, wearing silk pajamas the color of sand. " ‘Where did you go on vacation?’ Or it's about current events, which are really depressing."

In 2019, seeking a solution, Merrill teamed up with a friend, Kate MacArthur. They came up with prompts. Then cards. Sample questions: "Can love really cure all?" "If you could eliminate social media forever, would you?" "How do you know when you’re a grownup?" (Perhaps when you require scripted prompts to interact with others?) They’ve sold more than ten thousand packs of three hundred cards. "These exercises bring out something wild," Merrill said. "You set aside the persona you show up with—the perfect Instagram version of yourself. You give up your fear of being cancelled and connect with people on another level."

Merrill and MacArthur host dinners to see how their hypotheticals play out; Goldie Hawn showed up to one. On a recent Saturday, they hosted sixteen women, mostly strangers. All had been outfitted in pajamas made by Lunya, another company founded by Merrill.

Uniformed servers set down wooden planks of nigiri as MacArthur, in a gauzy white robe and matching pants, kicked off a "rapid-fire round," directing a question at each guest.

"Chances that we’re living in a computer simulation," she said. "Above ten per cent, or below?"

"Above," Leland Drummond, a founder of a direct-to-consumer underwear brand, said.

"The five major religions of the world are Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism," MacArthur said. "In a thousand years, will all five of these still exist?"

"I’m the worst person to get this," Erica Domesek, who owns a how-to Web site, said. "I joke that I’m only Jewish in the kitchen."

Merrill moved on to more prompts.

"Would you rather make one million dollars at fifteen years old or fifteen million at fifty years old?" Merrill said. "Raise your hand for a million at fifteen." Five hands went up.

"Because you could make the millions into much more," a jewelry designer said.

"How do you think it would change you, to be fifteen and have a million dollars?" MacArthur asked.

The jewelry designer said, "The risk is that you’re an asshole."

"Like, it's a high probability," Merrill said.

"Honestly, if it was in L.A., I would say it's gonna make you an asshole," the designer said. "The kids here are kind of fucked up."

Rachel Shillander, an architect, read the next question: "Is using makeup, hair dye, Botox, etc. a way of lying about our real appearance to the world?"

"Oh, damn," someone said. Eight hands went up.

"I’m pro-choice for Botox and all the other things," one respondent said. (She asked to remain anonymous, because her husband didn't know that she’d got Botox.) "I don't know that it's lying. I think the dangerous part is going too far." Casualties were mentioned: an aunt lost the ability to whistle (too much Botox), a relative was rumored to have died under the knife. (The anesthesiologist may have been on Snapchat.) The women discussed how much to reveal, and to whom.

"I go to places where I’m in just a sports bra and pants," a blond woman said. "Other moms will ask, ‘How are your boobs so perky?’ I’m, like, ‘Because they’re fucking fake!’ "

Next question: "If you didn't have to conform to society's or anyone else's expectations, what would your ideal living arrangement be with your significant other?" There was near-consensus: separate bathrooms, separate bedrooms, and, maybe, a shared bedroom.

"Not gonna lie—when I had COVID and two weeks in the guest room, I was loving it," a woman in indigo silk said. "I kept testing positive, and I was, like, yes."

"I think Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera had the ideal situation," Sam Klemick, an artist, said. "She had a house, he had a house, and there was a bridge."

"Imagine this," Merrill said, as platters of mochi circulated. She read off a card: "You’re really poor, and, despite working two jobs, you’re still struggling to pay for food and shelter for your family. You discover a way to steal a few dollars from tens of thousands of super-rich people. You’d steal no more than ten dollars from each wealthy family. Should you do this to help your own family?"

Four hands went up. "Wow," MacArthur said. "That's the least number of yeses we’ve ever gotten." ♦