Olympics Drag Queen “Last Supper”: A Controversy That Wasn’t
Some Christians were beside themselves with rage that the Olympic opening ceremony featured a part that people on social media began accusing of being a clear parody of “The Last Supper,” painted by Leonardo DaVinci, one of the most well-known artistic works in the world, depicting Jesus and the twelve apostles sitting down for a last Passover meal together.
Widespread Disapproval Over “Blasphemous” Olympics Performance
Commenters in online forums, and on social media platforms, could be heard to say that the performance at the Olympics was “blasphemous”, with many Christians steamed, fuming that someone should be held responsible.
C Spire, an American IT company out of Mississippi, even canceled its advertising with the Olympics over the performance.
C Spire posted this: “We were shocked by the mockery of the Last Supper during the opening ceremonies of the Paris Olympics. Spire will be pulling our advertising from the Olympics.”
Authorities including the French Catholic Church’s conference of bishops, the Russian Foreign Ministry, the Egyptian Anglican Communion, and others expressed their disapproval.
Even Mr. Elon Reeve Musk, of Twitter, Space-X, DOGE, and Tesla fame, shared his disapproval on his own platform, formerly known as Twitter, tweeting out this brief, but pointed message:
“This was extremely disrespectful to Christians.”
The Artists Behind the Olympic Opening Ceremony Drag Performance Respond to Criticism
Anne Descamps, the 2024 Paris Olympics spokeswoman, did not actually apologize for the performance as being blasphemous, and some news outlets have not stated such outright, but rather suggested this was the case without providing further detail.
Instead, Ms. Descamps had this to say, “Clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group. On the contrary, I think [concerning the] Thomas Jolly [drag performance], we really did try to celebrate community tolerance. Looking at the result of the polls that we shared, we believe that this ambition was achieved. If people have taken any offense we are, of course, really, really sorry.”
The ceremony’s chief artistic designer, Thomas Jolly, did not feel the need to apologize, stating, “My wish isn’t to be subversive, nor to mock or to shock. Most of all, I wanted to send a message of love, a message of inclusion, and not at all to divide.”
“We wanted to include everyone, as simple as that,” Mr. Jolly said. “In France, we have freedom of creation, artistic freedom. We are lucky in France to live in a free country. I didn’t have any specific messages that I wanted to deliver. In France, we are republic, we have the right to love whom we want, we have the right not to be worshipers, we have a lot of rights in France, and this is what I wanted to convey.”
French BFM TV Interviews the Designers
Thomas Jolly, Paris Olympic Games opening ceremony director, and Daphné Bürki, stylist and costume director working on the performance, were both invited as guests on the French BFMTV channel’s set Sunday morning.
The opportunity for them to respond to certain criticisms of the show, including those of the leader of France Insoumise Jean-Luc Mélenchon was presented, as was the space to provide apologies to offended Christians.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon expressed his concerns about the performance during the interview.
Jean-Luc Mélenchon explained, “I did not like the mockery of the Christian Last Supper. This does not concern everyone. But I ask, ‘What is the point of risking hurting believers?’ Even when you are anticlerical! We were speaking to the world that evening.”
Thomas Jolly responded in such a way as to totally deny the allegations, and a-la-Working-Girl-80s-Film-style, proceeded to explain where each visual element he chose was derived from. Christianity was not one of his sources, according to his account.
“It [(DaVinci’s Last Supper] is not my inspiration . There is Dyonisos [Philippe Katerine, the blue-painted man!] who arrives on this table. He is there because he is the god of the celebration in Greek mythology.
The god of wine who is one of the jewels of France, and the father of Sequana, the goddess who is linked to the river, the Seine.
The idea was to make a pagan festival linked to the gods of Olympus. You will never find in me a desire to mock and denigrate anyone. I wanted to carry out a ceremony which repairs, which reconciles. And also which reaffirms the values of our Republic, liberty-equality-fraternity.
On the other hand, if we use our work to regenerate behind this moment of union against division, hatred while it continues to progress, then that would be a great shame.”
Olympic Drag “Last Supper”: Rapid Social Media Disinformation Spread at Its Worst
While the performance received snowballing widespread condemnation, we must ask whether it’s deserved.
Was this drag performance aimed at ridiculing Christianity, as a few social media accounts first proposed?
The idea gained motion quickly, going viral, as it were, as it rolled out to the edges of social media, penetrating the different online social idea-set scenes.
But, was it true? Or, was this a consequence of the fast-spread of disinformation on social media platforms? And, what role did bias against the LGBTQIA community have in all of this?
Bias against people in the LGBTQ community by those groups and individuals we all already know probably don’t approve of the entire gay visibility and rights movement due to their belief systems?
Elon Musk, for one, is widely considered an anti-trans voice, though he has never indicated that he is anti-LGBT. More specifically, Elon has not expressed that he is “anti-trans,” but rather has stated that he’s against transitioning surgeries and sex-altering hormones for those who are still minors.
Any Resemblance to the Last Supper Is Spurious: An Examination of the Visual Details
For the purposes of this investigation, we shall refer to our accompanying image, which features the drag show scene in question, at two points in time as it unfolded, as well as renaissance master artist Leonardo DaVinci’s “The Last Supper.”
Some of the invective is based on the fact that the woman standing in front of the DJ equipment in the center of the Olympic display had what Christians interpreted as a halo around her head.
Does this look anything like a “halo,” or was it just a weird head dress or crown costuming? (Examine the photos, please!)
Perhaps this was a stylized halo?
Very…stylized? To the point of no longer looking like the empty-center letter “O” or zero “0” halo but simply rather a solid circle with seven rays extending forth?
In fact, while some depictions of Jesus do show a halo around the head, this particular painting by DaVinci does not.
So even if this were to be considered a halo, of sorts, that’s not even relevant, as far as mimicking the details of “The Last Supper” are concerned. How can this be a match if it’s not in the painting that many claim the drag performance references in order to to mock?
And so, we can say it’s a head dress or crown that does resemble a halo, but no specific halo we’ve found, though there’s no halo in the DaVinci work, making this detail irrelevant, for the sake of this discussion.
It has also been suggested by The Marians of the Immaculate Conception, alternatively called the Divine Mercy Marians, that the headpiece worn by the person in the middle represented a monstrance.
A monstrance is defined as follows by Encyclopedia Britannica, “ in the Roman Catholic Church and some other churches, a vessel in which the consecrated eucharistic host (the sacramental bread) is carried in processions and is displayed during certain devotional ceremonies…”
In actual fact there is little more resemblance to a halo than a monstrance. An actual monstrance in actual church is shown in the photograph below. Decide for yourself if this is such a close resemblance.
The Sacred Heart of…Love? How A Mere Hand Symbol Drew Ire
Some wrote about how the drag queen in the center in the blue dress is holding her hands up to make a heart.
How does this resemble Jesus depicted in the painting, seated a the table with outstretched arms and upturned hands, apparently deep in prayer, perhaps reciting the kiddush?
Researching this matter, you’ll discover that Christians do, indeed, have certain hand symbols associated with Jesus. The below image shows these hand gestures. Does this resemble the way people commonly make hearts with their hands in popular culture, as did the woman in the middle of the drag performance at the Olympics? 
Colors and Costumery: No Hint of Jesus or Any Real Supper
The colors were not chosen, nor the costumery, to evoke anything from the famed DaVinci painting. At all. No resemblance, no witty shifts on the color wheel. Nothing.
The decorations do not evoke being within an indoor room, as is the case in the DaVinci painting.
Decor could easily have evoked the illusion of perspective using lights or beads, but those same design elements were instead chosen to be in a pattern that do not connote an indoor room.
Yet another miss, not a match! But wait, there’s more…
Not a single performer is posed as a figure in the DaVinci painting is, at either of the two freeze-frames of the performance I offer accompanying this opinion.
While they did “Strike a Pose,” voguing is still big in France, where LGBTQ people enjoy the decades-old dance form popularized in the then-poor East Village in NYC in the 1980s by gay men.
Again, not a single person is posed similarly to a figure in the painting.
No one is focusing on, or turned toward, the central figure, the DJ, whereas in DaVinci’s painting, this is definitely the case.
I guess it’s fair to say that the person of focus is in the middle of the grouping in both the Olympic performance and DaVinci’s work.
In the Olympic performance, it’s because she’s making the heart hand symbol while no one else is. She’s also the only one wearing a conspicuous headpiece.
In DaVinci’s work, it’s because it’s related to the Christian story of Jesus, the central figure of the Christian canon.
And, every other person focuses on that figure in the painting.
Probably most photographs and paintings, to be fair, also have a central figure. You know. The guy in the middle holding the sign reading, “Company Picnic, Year 2 Post-Covid”?
Is this a match between the Olympic performance and DaVinci’s painting?
C’mon man, be serious! That is no significant match, if we’re being totally honest.
In fact, central to the theme of the DaVinvi Work is the betrayal of Jesus by Judas.
That is, essentially, what is being depicted in the painting, a literal scene from the Christian Bible.
There is no suggestion of anything like that in Thomas Jolly’s performance.
Additionally, they are not at a table, but rather in front of a flat, raised surface.
In the Last Supper, the diners are mostly seated.
At the Olympic Games Opening Ceremony, none of the performers were seated, save for a child or adolescent seated on the table at one later point in time.
The 30 (or 35) Apostles? How the Drag Queen Olympic Opening Show Wasn’t What It Seemed
There’s another significant issue, spurned by some major media outlets: The DaVinci painting showed Jesus and the Twelve apostles.
That’s thirteen in all.
The two stop-frames I present from the Olympic celebration depict at least eighteen people.
Some media outlets have zoomed in and therefore clipped off the sides of the image to make it appear that there are, indeed, thirteen people, like the DaVinci work depicts.
A later snapshot of the Olympic drag performance shows at least thirty people, not including the scary Dionysus served on a platter, complete with a dome that rises into the air.
And so, a meal is suggested. A meal…of sorts.
Is this anything like the Passover meal DaVinci sought to capture?
The meal is…a blue man of huge proportions, surrounded by what appear to be vegetables. What the…?? No one is going to literally eat him.
It’s Dionysus, whom, according to Wikipedia, was, “… the god of wine-making, orchards and fruit, vegetation, fertility, festivity, insanity, ritual madness, religious ecstasy, and theatre…” in ancient Greece.
And, this Olympic drag performance actually evokes the Feast of Dionysus, complete with Dionysus reclining on the dining table.
Dionysus would be at home at a festive meal, eating little, imbibing much. This Bacchanalian festival has also been oft depicted in paintings. Here is but one example:
Feast of Dionysus Painting
A table without food wouldn’t bother Dionysus. Just a lack of wine.
Insofar as accuracy is concerned, this is a match, and a real similarity between the Olympic performance and the DaVinci painting.
Both are related to dining.
One is an actual meal with people seated and dishes and plates and cups, the second a grotesque blue festivity god lying supine on a platter.
A match…of sorts, nevertheless, a match, all the same.
However, do consider that sex, family, food, work, and worship are significant parts of life.
It’s no coincidence that these make their way into performances, plays, movies, and songs.
And, this was the god of feasts, after all. We don’t expect to find him reading books or watching T.V.
Some might go further and suggest that partaking of the Dionysus figure on the platter is akin to the Catholic practice of receiving the blood and body of Jesus in the sacrament of Communion.
Now, we are stretched quite far, way beyond what we probably should regard as reasonable.
But that’s okay; it’s part of the process.
There are a few other similarities between DaVinci’s work and Thomas Sweet’s.
People are lined up, facing forward. Clearly, a match.
Just like when someone’s taking a photograph of a group and everyone faces the camera.
That is a quite common occurrence, wouldn’t you say?
The “Table” in the Olympic Drag Performance
The narrow white strip on the raised surface could also be said to resemble the shape of the top of the table in the DaVinci painting, looking at the image in a photograph.
And, the red strip could be said to be a very stylized depiction of the front of a table.
In real life, where everything viewed is in 3D, this would have no been quite so. It’s an illusion, but when we consider that the actual paintings being recreated depict Dionysus, it makes sense, as most of those paintings of the feast include a table with food placed upon it.
So, it’s a rough match, but let’s credit this one anyway. So far, the pro-match proponents are lagging. Badly.
Finally A Match Between DaVinci’s Last Supper and Jolly’s Olympic Show: A Shape
There’s another visual similarity: The dome of the platter with Dionysus lying on it in the performance is (roughly) the same shape as the portico over the door behind Jesus in the DaVinci work.
There. I finally found a good match.
And, it’s not even a very good match, if we really look at the lack of other, more clear, matches. Without that context, it’s not much.
The dome is in the foreground; the portico is in the background. Eh, it’s not much.
How the Artists Might Have Hung the Lights to Suggest the Room the DaVinci Painting Depicted If That Were Their Intention.
However, we cannot honestly state that there are no similarities. There are similarities, but they are few and weak.
Concluding Notes: Mockery of DaVinci’s Last Supper Not Supported
In conclusion, there is very little similarity between the Olympic drag performance and DaVinci’s Last Supper.
This is an uproar without substantial actual reason.
Christians may rightly be questioning the central position of pagan influences in the performance.
To a Christian, such images may be considered abhorrent, reminders of evil civilizations past.
However, we should remember that ancient Greece was what Christians would consider a pagan society.
Thus, the elements of the theme that evoke pagan ideas might find their way into the Olympics Opening Celebration performances, as our own modern world’s Olympic Games are merely a nod to, and really a resurrection of, the Olympics Games staged in ancient Greece in millennia past.
So, what’s the answer? Are some looking for trouble because they’re troubled by the drag queen aspect of the performance?
Have we become so adversarial toward a group of people that we invent details that support our feelings and only later check to see if any of the details are based in factual, verifiable reality?
Let’s not do this.
If you’re a Christian, you have a right to be offended…when there is a real offense.
Just like a Muslim would feel offended by disrespectful performances about their prophets, or the Jews would be about their own worship.
However, let’s be real.
Even if you’re a Christian itching for what you regard as a righteous fight against evil and a chance to stand up for your faith, this isn’t it, most clearly not.
The resemblance between Leonardo DaVinci’s painting “The Last Supper” and Thomas Sweet’s Olympic drag performance is not significant or even really worthy of mention.
Our comprehensive analysis of the facts proves that there are better battles for those so inclined to fight, to fight.
Thus, the uproar was not well-deserved, or deserved at all whatever. Go spend your time protesting something that matters. That’s my opinion.
Even with A Real Lack of Similarities, Wasn’t This Still Mocking Jesus?
Some might suggest that even after this careful evaluation, we can’t determine that the drag Olympic performance wasn’t meant to evoke “The Last Supper,” via sparse and loose association.
If there is any association, it is such an association as this. Let’s ask where we’re headed with this.
A creative work is verboten not because it mockingly references religious images, stories, or figures, but merely because some feel that there are elements of the design that could be said to be somehow connected to the religious, though not directly.
If we accept this premise, then we no longer accept that we have Freedom of Expression in France, or any other civilized nation.
While some even disagree that we should have limits on criticism or mockery of others’ faith, this is a far cry from that. Here we only have shades and slight suggestions; if this is deemed irreverent, then what room is there for criticism of religion? Or, anything?
Can Drag Performers Depict The Last Supper, Or Is This Off-Limits?
And, what if the designers had meant to evoke “The Last Supper”? (We already know this is NOT the case, based on their own words and a lack of matching details!)
How is that wrong? Is calling to mind the life of Jesus now a sin?
Or, was it only a sin because we judge the dancers and performers as SINNERS, because they are clearly drag performers, a group that it’s acceptable to rain hatred upon? Jesus said that we’re all sinners, and let the pure innocent throw the first stone.
Contradiction, much?
In other words, even if this had been a clear depiction of “The Last Supper,” where would the mockery have been? What would have been the harm in such a depiction?
In the actual performance at the Olympics, which for some evoke notions of “The Last Supper” despite the creators’ denying such associations were considered when creating, where is the mockery?
Why can children in a church play put on such a skit, but not drag queens at the Olympics in France?
Is that to say that drag queens can do no right, that all they touch is tainted? That it’s not fitting to depict drag queens as Jesus and the twelve apostles?
What if the designers had instead consciously and willfully chosen to represent the scene depicted in DaVinci’s painting, and had staged the actors as the twelve apostles and Jesus, using their precise posture, limited the number of people on-stage to thirteen, and coordinated the wardrobe to correspond to each attendee of “The Last Supper” meal?
Some important questions are raised here; it’s my hope that Christians and non-Christians alike consider the finer points of all this, and the implications of stifling expression based on loosely associated themes that some people perceive are there.
It’s a slippery slope to slide down, and where we end up is not at all good.
There’s also the issue of Established Religion. We don’t have one in the U.S. of A. Some of us love Jesus, others of us don’t. That’s fine.
We don’t have a state religion, and people can actually critique their own, or one another’s faiths, all legally protected by our system.
Would A Disrespectful Interpretation of “The Last Supper” Even Be Blasphemous?
Blasphemy is speaking sacrilegiously about the Creator or sacred things.
If Christians accept Jesus as Messiah, or even as some Christians believe, the Actual Godhead, then a depiction of “The Last Supper” that shows disrespect to Jesus or the apostles might be considered blasphemy.
One such example would be having all the attendees depicted as drunkards. That would clearly be blasphemous.
Another might be showing Jesus as a buffoon. That would also qualify.
It seems that the Olympics drag performance does not qualify, even if it had been a willful recreation of the scene in DaVinci’s “The Last Supper.”
Editor’s note: August 5, 2024. The Vatican has since responded with this statement, “At a prestigious event where the whole world comes together to share common values, there should be no allusions ridiculing the religious convictions of many people. The freedom of expression, which is clearly not called into question here, is limited by respect for others.” Additionally, this article was posted in “Opinions” but I failed to write “Opinion” in the title. This has since been corrected. J.K. Junior Assistant Overnight Editor
