The Last Supper on the Seine. And now some people are making a scene out of it. In the middle of his breathtaking opening ceremony, Thomas Jolly slipped in Leonardo da Vinci’s legendary painting of Christ’s last meal among his apostles. But here’s the thing. The main characters in the Italian painter’s masterpiece were this time embodied in the flesh by drag queens, a transgender model and on the table, under a giant bell jar, Philippe Katerine as a nearly naked Dionysus. One of the most spectacular moments of the evening for some. One of the most shocking for others.
The director’s audacity did not please the Church at all. In a statement published Saturday, the French Bishops’ Conference (CEF) deplored a ceremony that “unfortunately included scenes of derision and mockery of Christianity.” “This morning, we are thinking of all the Christians on all continents who were hurt by the outrageousness and provocation of certain scenes,” the French episcopate also wrote, while adding that the opening ceremony offered “wonderful moments of beauty, joy, rich in emotion and universally acclaimed.”
“The idea is to bring a new perspective”
“We’re not making fun of anything,” says Piche, a drag queen revealed by the show. Drag Race who participated in the sequence. No one was dressed as Jesus, no one was parodying him, neither in the costumes nor in the behaviors. The idea is to bring a new perspective. In the past, there have been a lot of representations of the apostles’ table and it has never shocked anyone. As luck would have it, when it is LGBT and drag, it is disturbing. But we are used to it. People are obsessed with gender issues that disturb conservatives.
For his part, Thomas Jolly assumes his intentions of departure. “This ceremony is political for me, in the sense of polisthe Greek word, it unites the citéthe continent the world, stressed the director of the ceremony Saturday morning at a press conference. There is no desire to be subversive or shock but to say we are this great We with the republican ideas of inclusion, generosity, solidarity that we desperately need. Here, artistic creation is free, we have this chance. There is no desire to pass on militant messages but republican messages: in France, we have the right to love each other as we want, in France we have the right to believe or not believe. The idea was to make these values shine through.