2024 Olympics: Opening Ceremony's 'Last Supper' tribute draws criticism

PARIS — In an Opening Ceremony that featured a seductive ménage à trois, a singing decapitated head, and a nearly-nude blue deity, it’s a scene of mealtime that’s drawing the most heat.

Well into the four-hour-long ceremony, a collection of drag queens and other performers gathered to pose in a scene that was deliberately reminiscent of Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting, “The Last Supper.” The scene ended with the revelation of a beefy blue Dionysus, apparently ready to partake in all manner of earthly pleasures.

Da Vinci’s “The Last Supper” — which is actually in Milan, not the Louvre — depicts Jesus’ final meal with the apostles, the night before Christ’s crucifixion. It’s a holy and sacred moment in Christianity, so seeing nontraditional performers put a 2024 spin on it didn’t go over well with a vocal segment of the Christian faith.

Matteo Salvini, an Italian official, posted the images side-by-side on X and wrote, in Italian, “Opening the Olympics by insulting billions of Christians around the world was a really bad start, dear French. Seedy.”

Kansas City Chiefs kicker Harrison Butker, who aired his conservative views on faith and family earlier this year, posted video of the scene, along with a Bible verse, Galatians 6:7-8. That verse reads, in part, “Be not deceived, God is not mocked.”

Paris Olympics officials pushed back on the contention that the performance was anti-Christian. “Clearly, there was never an intention to show disrespect towards any religious group or belief,” organizers said in a statement to the Telegraph. “On the contrary, each of the tableaux in the Paris 2024 Opening Ceremony were intended to celebrate community and tolerance.” Organizers further noted that pop culture, from “The Simpsons” to “The Sopranos,” has parodied “The Last Supper” for decades, if not centuries.

This wasn’t the first sociopolitical controversy of these Games, and it won’t be the last. After all, the only thing that travels faster than Olympians is opinions about the Olympics.