The eviction notice says the protests are the reason. That's the whole trick.
The breach notice that closed Divine Playhouse cites the protests against it as grounds, and warns more protests are almost certain to come.
A Sydney arts venue has closed a week after opening, and the notice that shut it down names the protests against it as the grounds.
Divine Playhouse opened on July 8 at 420 Kent Street in the CBD, in a building that has not been a church since 1932.
It was St John the Evangelist, built in 1868. For about 70 years after that it was the Genesian Theatre, named for the patron saint of actors, and home to one company for more than 60 of them.
About 70 people from the Catholic group Fit for the Kingdom and the Christian brotherhood The Prodigal Sons protested the opening night. Police issued one move-on direction, to a 21-year-old man, and he complied.
The next day, the landlord's lawyers sent a notice of breach ordering the operator, Heaps Gay Events, to cease “offensive trade” within two days.
Read the reasoning, because it is doing something specific.
The notice says the venue “insulted and mocked the sincerely held religious beliefs of millions of Christian Australians”.
It says the trade “has been the subject of significant protest and public criticism, given its offensive nature”.
And it says that because “future public protests are almost certain to occur and are likely to endanger members of the public”, two days to close is reasonable.
The protest is the evidence. The threat of more protest is the deadline.
Nothing in that requires the tenant to have breached anything. It requires only that enough people object, loudly, outside.
Meta then removed Divine Playhouse's accounts, along with Heaps Gay's and a number of personal and LGBTQIA+ community accounts, after complaints. They came back four days later.
“We strongly believe we have acted in good faith throughout this whole process,” Heaps Gay founder Kat Dopper said.
The venue had already given ground once. It was announced as Unholy Playhouse and renamed before opening, after Christian complaints.
Premier Chris Minns said the state is checking whether the events delivered match what was promised in the application for its $100,000 Create NSW grant, and that it was “hard to believe” the old church was the “best location”.
The building has not held a service in 94 years.
Divine Playhouse was funded for a year. Heaps Gay says it would have put more than $650,000 into the independent arts sector and supported about 1,500 artists and workers.
City of Sydney deputy lord mayor Jess Miller, who spoke at the opening, said it was not her place to judge what counts as art or what is offensive, but that she was sympathetic to those whose livelihoods the decision hit.
The Prodigal Sons and Fit for the Kingdom say they are not trying to silence anyone. More protests are scheduled at the site.
They are barely necessary now. The mechanism is proved: object loudly enough, and the lease does the rest.