Botticelli in the Fire

Written by Jordan Tannahill & Directed by Sarah Emslie

Botticelli in the Fire is a queer, fictionalized account of Sandro Botticelli’s painting of his most famous work, The Birth of Venus, by Canadian playwright Jordan Tannahill.

In this epic, set against the backdrop of the early Renaissance, Botticelli personally guides the audience with crude, contemporary warmth. He tells of his relationship with apprentice Leonardo daVinci, tension with the ruling Medicis, and the tides of oppression swelling from the Catholic theocracy, embodied by the charismatic and dangerous Friar Savonarola. As the Black Plague rages, Sandro grows more threatened each day by Church-driven pyres of secular art, literature, and “sodomites”. At once a glittering celebration of the spirit of queer survival and love, and abrasive study of the demonization of vice, pleasure, and sex, Botticelli in the Fire asks: What do we owe to each other in times of strife? What do we sacrifice, for love, safety, or god?

• $25.00 inc $3.00 fee
• 16-April 27, 2024
• 120 minutes
• Fringe Theatre Arts Barns
• Backstage Theatre
• 18A
• 
  Contains violence, nudity, sexual content, adult language/content, drugs/alcohol, religious content, flashing lights/strobe, smoke/fog