The Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras has been forced to deal with an “existential threat” by calling off its official party just weeks before the event was due to take place, as it battles with internal dissentions.
On Tuesday afternoon, Mardi Gras’ Chief Executive Jesse Matheson said the ticketed $2 million after-party usually attended by more than 10,000 revellers has been in the red since 2020 as the festival attempts to recoup costs.
“I was appointed CEO and tasked with renewing the festival following two years of significant financial loss. A major contributor to that loss has been the Mardi Gras Party, which has run at a deficit every year since 2020 following the loss of the Royal Hall of Industries,” Matheson said.
“As part of stabilising the organisation, the decision was made to cancel all events except Parade, Fair Day, Laneway and the Glitter Club viewing area, and to create Black Cherry and a new celebration event for the First Nations community, After Party with Blak Joy.”
Community producers and cultural institutions stepped in to help support some events. On Monday, the Inner West Council announced it would host the Sissy Ball.
“This decision was not taken lightly. Facing an existential threat to the future of Mardi Gras, and with new sponsorship uncertain, it was absolutely the right decision,” Matheson said.
Matheson said the official party, held last year in the Entertainment Quarter in Moore Park, cost more to deliver than the Mardi Gras Parade and Fair Day, despite being ticketed. The party also lost its headline artist, “who would have been the biggest name at the party since Cher”.
“This has been heartbreaking – but I believe it is the right decision for our community and for the future of Mardi Gras,” Matheson said. “Party will return.”
The announcement follows a tumultuous few weeks inside the Mardi Gras board, where tensions flared between co-chairs Kathy Pavlich and Mits Delisle and two Pride in Protest board directors, Luna Choo and Damien Nguyen.
On January 13, the board voted not to implement three motions filed by activist group Pride in Protest, passed at the annual general members meeting last November, that called for a stronger focus on transgender rights in the parade, anti-discrimination law reform and funding.
Before the board voted to scupper the resolutions, Choo and Nguyen supported the motion when replying to members using their Mardi Gras emails.
Both directors said the replies were sent in a personal capacity and did not represent the board. On January 23, Choo and Nguyen said they had been locked out of their official Mardi Gras emails.
Co-chairs Delisle and Pavlich supported censuring Choo and Nguyen on January 25. In the motion, Choo, a transgender woman who uses she/they pronouns, was referred to as “he”.
Delisle said the board’s decision to censure Choo and Nguyen was based on the unofficial use of their email accounts to campaign against the organisation’s decisions.
“Using [official email accounts] for campaigning or advocacy against the organisation crossed a clear governance boundary,” he said in a statement. “That boundary applies to all directors, regardless of who they are or what cause they support.”
On behalf of the board, Delisle also apologised for misgendering Choo, but said the leaking of the “confidential” censure motion had become a “serious matter”.
“We also sincerely apologise for the misgendering of Luna Choo in an internal document. We have apologised directly to her, corrected the record, and correct pronouns or gender-neutral language will be used going forward,” he said.
Choo and Nguyen hit back by supporting a censure motion against Delisle and Pavlich on January 28, claiming they had failed to meet the board’s governance expectations by “humiliating a transgender colleague and board director through misgendering her in front of the entire [Mardi Gras] board, company secretary, and chief executive on January 25”.
Delisle and Pavlich succeeded in their bid to censure Nguyen and Luna Choo last Friday.
“From calling me a man in the motion notice, censuring all pro-trans directors two weeks from season, to continually blocking support for transgender rights calls from members. This is bigotry masked in corporate speak,” Choo said.
Nguyen said: “I am appalled that the board remains firm in upholding transphobia in spite of community outrage and growing anti-trans rhetoric and policy … I will continue my unwavering support for the trans community. No LGB without the T.”
Delisle says the board’s decision to drop the motion calling for the parade to focus on transgender rights that was passed at the AGM last year “was not a rejection of trans rights”.
“The board’s concern was that the motion raised practical and operational challenges and introduced expectations around parade messaging that conflicted with Mardi Gras’ long-standing approach to creative independence and diversity of community messaging,” he said.
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