Prepare to lose your shit over Dor & Josh’s movie-themed wedding with epic movie posters and a Romy & Michelle first dance

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 | Photography by Dette Snaps
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The Offbeat Bride: Dor, Social Media Consultant

Her offbeat partner: Josh, Filmmaker

Date and location of wedding: Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria Queens, New York — April 20, 2015

Our offbeat wedding at a glance:

Josh and I met at a film festival after following each other for a few months on Twitter. We are total movie freaks, and he's a filmmaker, so it only made sense that we had a movie-themed wedding on a movie theater stage inside a movie museum.

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

My favorite details:

  • The whole thing was positioned as a movie premiere for a film called Dial M for Marriage, from the save the date (parody of a Daily Variety article) to the invitation (which imitated a movie premiere ticket) to the red carpet and paparazzi positioned at the entrance
  • Centerpieces featured one of 16 fake posters designed by our friends such as The Bourne Matrimony, Dor Interrupted, Apocalypse Vow, Being Josh Johnson, Dor & Josh's Excellent Adventure, etc.
  • We showed a short film during the reception which was made by a friend of Josh's called “Josh Johnson Meets the Devil Ant”
  • The back of our wedding program featured a mock-up home video advertisement for the VHS of Dial M for Marriage

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Tell us about the ceremony:

Both of us were walked down the aisle by both of our parents. Our friends did readings from our favorite movies, Muriel's Wedding and 8 1/2

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

My mom and her friend sang a movie song, “Sunrise, Sunset,” while childhood photos showed on the screen.

There were no rings. We don't wear 'em, so why spend the money? We exchanged VHS copies of the movie The Ring (one original Japanese version, one remake) with vows like, “I promise to stay by your side until I am dead, which will hopefully be in more than seven days.”

We made a short film which was a parody “pre-show entertainment” – a hosted pre-show with several segments including:

  • A “Behind the Scenes” documentary with family and friends
  • A fake reality show about how people in Minnesota play Duck Duck Grey Duck instead of Duck Duck Goose
  • A professionally produced trailer

Our officiant was the actor Zach Galligan who was the star of Gremlins 1 and 2 — the latter being one of Josh's favorite films of all time.

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Tell us about your reception:

We had only one speech, from me, thanking my folks and my in-laws for going with the flow on the super non-traditional wedding, despite being conservative Midwestern Lutherans who people might have expected to push back on some of our wilder stuff. I also thanked my exes for teaching me how to be a good partner (100 percent of my exes were there).

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Our first dance was a recreation of the Time after Time dance from Romy & Michele's High School Reunion which we'd choreographed (with our good friend as the third dancer) in secret.

Dor + Josh's first dance, Romy and Michele style.

Guests were able to browse the entire musuem before and after the ceremony as well, which at the time included a special Mad Men exhibit timed with the end of the series.

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

What was your most important lesson learned?

We wanted a wedding people would feel special for having attended — one where they felt entertained more than anything else and one where they felt included at every step of the way. We wanted there to be inside jokes for every different group that was represented. We wanted them to see themselves (literally) on the screen or see versions of us that they knew. We didn't want anyone to feel that disconnected sensation you get when you're watching someone's best man give a speech about their college years, and it occurs to you, “Man, I don't really know these people at all.” We wanted everyone to see the us they knew represented, even if they had only known us a few months or even if they hadn't seen us in years.

Movie-themed wedding from @offbeatbride

Our biggest lesson would be choosing battles: what to push back on and what to just go with, regarding stakeholders. Josh's dad is a minister and wanted to marry us, but it didn't fit the theme, so we had him do so five minutes before we took the stage. My mom had many wants, but the biggest was that she wanted to sing. So we added that in.

Here's a Storify of the day!

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Comments on Prepare to lose your shit over Dor & Josh’s movie-themed wedding with epic movie posters and a Romy & Michelle first dance

  1. Ahhh – thank you so much for featuring my wedding, Offbeat Bride! Grinning so hard.

    In case anybody wants to see the (3 min) video of the ring exchange, or the whole pre-show (including the docu-series about how Minnesotans play Duck Duck Grey Duck instead of Duck Duck Goose – really!) I put those videos here: http://dordotson.com/2015/07/31/dial-m-for-marriage-more-videos-and-photos/

    (Hope it is OK to post that – if not, just let me know!)

    No way I would have had half as cool an event were it not for so much inspiration from Offbeat Bride – thanks for existing and being an awesome community.

    • I’m so glad to see this! It made me tear up more than once. I know the incredible amount to work (and fun and stress and drunken crafting date nights) it takes to put something like that together and I just imagine all the time you guys got to spend working it out! Congrats and I hope this wedding is an inspiration to others to make their weddings as much a reflection of them as this seemed to be of you two!

      • Beth – thank you so much for the kind words and for the congrats. It really was SO FUN to plan! I very much miss planning it, since it was a super creative process. It was just so fulfilling to be able to say early on “we really want people to laugh and be entertained above all” and then have that be exactly what people said.

    • Totally! My partner is the science based nerd to my creative based nerd and even almost 2years later he still talks about how he misses that process. we took a very similar approach, wanting our guests to feel included in an experience. I think I identified with your sense of humor and felt like I could see your personalities in every aspect. So glad it went over so well!
      If you ever miss the process, we found that planning themed dinner parties for, say, birthdays lets us recreate that creative planning process on a smaller scale and makes for a really wonderful final treat.
      Cheers!

  2. This is so great! I love the Romy and Michelle dance! It looks like you put so much work into this, and the attention to detail is amazing. Congrats!

    • Thank you! I’m so glad to see that folks are entertained by the dance. People at my wedding were definitely dyyyyyying of laughter – and it’s great to see it resonating beyond friends and family. The dancing – even (especially!) the rehearsal – was actually our favorite part of wedding planning.

  3. This may very well be one of my favourite weddings I’ve ever seen! It helps that I performed a skit from Romy and Michelle in college and have always LOVED that movie! Your first dance absolutely takes the cake! I hope that thing goes viral! Congrats on your marriage and you looked stunning (especially in that RED dress, love it!)!!!

    • Reaven – that sounds awesome. We love the movie, too. Not so much viral but I did tweet the link to Mira Sorvino and she retweeted it and seemed to have enjoyed watching, so that’s fun. Thank you very much for the high praise and the dress compliment as well. 🙂

  4. This is amazing. LOVE the first dance. And the bride looked killer in all her looks. Love the jewelry!

    • Ahhhh, what a nice thing to say. That made my day. I presume this is not coming from my friend Rhiannon who was in attendance at Dial M for Marriage but either way, what a wonderful compliment. 🙂 Thank you.

  5. AHH we did the Romy & Michelle dance at our wedding reception too! Impromptu and unchoreographed, but still rad… cool to see there are like minds out there 🙂

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