{"id":814529,"date":"2026-07-21T14:37:21","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T14:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/814529\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T14:37:21","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T14:37:21","slug":"divine-playhouse-organiser-of-cancelled-queer-venue-says-shes-received-constant-death-threats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/814529\/","title":{"rendered":"Divine Playhouse: Organiser of cancelled queer venue says she\u2019s received constant death threats"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Kat Dopper, the organiser of the cancelled LGBTQ Sydney nightclub<\/a> housed in a 158-year-old deconsecrated church, says she has received \u201cconstant\u201d death threats and homophobic messages following the opening of her experimental venue two weeks ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of them, for example, was, \u2018You know that cliff right near Bondi that the gays fell off? You all need to get over there and go for a swim\u2019,\u201d the founder of queer events company Heaps Gay says. \u201cIt\u2019s been full on … I have been in a state of extreme stress.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"KatKat Dopper, founder of Heaps Gay and Divine Playhouse, at Hyde Park. Louise Kennerley<\/p>\n

Only 10 weeks earlier, she was handed the keys to the 420 Kent Street structure in the CBD \u2013 and says she could hardly have predicted it would become the site of the city\u2019s latest culture war with members of the Christian community.<\/p>\n

\u201cI started Heaps Gay, my other business, back in 2013 when we were fighting for marriage equality. And we\u2019re at a place now where we\u2019re getting death threats because we have created a performance art space that happens to be inside a church,\u201d Dopper says.<\/p>\n

Christian groups have protested outside the Divine Playhouse \u2013 renamed from the Unholy Playhouse \u2013 and claim it is mocking their religion.<\/p>\n

Dopper announced the landlord had terminated the lease on Monday<\/a> and revealed the groups had been building pressure on the landlord before it even opened.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe deconsecrated church has been used as a theatre in the past.Janie Barrett<\/p>\n

\u201cThe name change came from a conversation with our landlords, 12 hours before we opened doors,\u201d Dopper said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe landlord mentioned that they had some Christian groups reaching out about it. I just wanted to keep the space open, so I offered to remove the things that they felt were offensive, even though I believe they were not offensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

The church is owned by developer Revelop, co-founded by billionaire cousins Anthony El-Hazouri and Charbel Hazzouri.<\/p>\n

The lease\u2019s contract was made out to Heaps Gay events \u2013 which often hosts fringe-style queer events \u2013 but it is not clear whether the landlord or co-founders were aware of the intended use of the space.<\/p>\n

\"OpeningOpening Night at Divine Playhouse.Anna Hay<\/p>\n

A lease agreement, seen by this masthead, says the venue was permitted to be used for \u201centertainment\u201d.<\/p>\n

Revelop\u2019s lawyers provided Dopper one week to vacate the property after citing a 1842 NSW tenant law of \u201coffensive trade\u201d, which is used to regulate foul smells and industrial waste.<\/p>\n

Heaps Gay\u2019s lawyers say it has never before been extended to cover so-called questions of \u201cmoral\u201d offensiveness.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got the keys, we produced and created the most incredible new site and small venue for Sydney audiences, and then within a day of being open, we\u2019ve just basically had legal letters back and forth to be evicted, which we deeply believe is illegal,\u201d Dopper said.<\/p>\n

El-Hazouri said while he does not condone the threats received by Dopper and the Heaps Gay team, he was unaware of how the space was going to be used.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe issue here is one where the nature of the events being so offensive and targeted towards a religious group, to Christian\u2019s,\u201d El-Hazouri said.<\/p>\n

El-Hazouri said his team does not believe the \u201coffensive\u201d basis used to terminate the lease is constrained to noise and odour, and is instead about trade based on general definitions of the word.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s nothing in our view that limits the definition of offensive to noise and odour,\u201d he said. \u201cThe events \u2026 they were targeting Christian beliefs \u2026 and for us it\u2019s the height of offence to say it\u2019s about arts and culture when you\u2019re derogating an entire groups belief.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related Article\"Divine<\/a><\/p>\n

El-Hazouri also said he believes the Catholic-themed events at the nightclub amounted to hate speech.<\/p>\n

\u201cLove, community and art, that\u2019s what the event organiser said \u2026 I do not believe those words are synonymous with the events that took place and were proposed to take place,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the equivalent to hate speech in my opinion because it was targeted at people\u2019s religious views.\u201d<\/p>\n

Catholic protester Liam Aquilina said the community\u2019s issue was not with the LGBTQ community but with the \u201cmockery\u201d of faith.<\/p>\n

Despite the backlash, Dopper said the NSW government has been \u201cwholeheartedly supportive\u201d of the venue and its program.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe support that has come from the various government bodies, the industry, the wider sector, and the community all across Sydney. We\u2019ve had over 17,000 signatures on the petition in a few days, and the GoFundMe \u2026 [it\u2019s] been beyond.\u201d<\/p>\n

Want to read more about Sydney\u2019s live music scene? We\u2019ve got you!<\/p>\n

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\"KaylaKayla Olaya<\/a> is a culture reporter at The Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from your saved list to add…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":814530,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-814529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=814529"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/814529\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/814530"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=814529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=814529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=814529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}