Milo Is Coming To The Patio Theater Next Month; Venue Calls Rental 'A Non-Political Decision'
By Stephen Gossett in News on Oct 12, 2017 9:24PM
Milo Yiannopoulos / Getty Images / Photo: Drew Angerer
Alt-right commentator and former Breitbart senior editor Milo Yiannopoulos is scheduled to appear at a speaking event at the Patio Theater next month. News of the engagement spread on social media on Thursday morning and early afternoon, with many on Facebook and Twitter raising concern about the appearance. Management of the theater meanwhile told Chicagoist that the rental of the space was "a non-political decision" done as a business-to-business rental between Yiannopoulus' publishing company.
Theater operator Charlie Burns said management was not initially aware that the publisher represented Milo when it attempted to rent the space for a local stop on Yiannopoulus' Troll Academy Tour. But he said there was no negative response from local officials when they notified them of the speaking gig, and he pledged to provide necessary security.
Burns told Chicagoist via email:
"This was a business to business rental. The publishing company that represent’s Mr. Yiannopoulus requested to rent the theater for this part of the book tour. We reached out to local officials to let them know about this event and had no negative feedback.. It was a non-political decision to rent the theater to his publisher’s corporation. We will take proper security precautions to make sure the tour, fans and any protesters are safe and respected during the event. We are trying to work with Ted Talks, book authors & speaker publishing companies for future Events. This is one of many different book authors & speakers we will host in the future."
Yiannopoulus' Chicago date is scheduled for Nov. 13 at 8:15 p.m. at the Patio. Answer Chicago on Thursday created an event page for a protest to coincide with his appearance.
There have been a few controversies related to Milo here in Chicago in recent years. Criticism emerged when ads for the provocateur's book, Dangerous, were featured at CTA stops. And he was notably met with a much-publicized protest when he appeared at Depaul in 2016. And the Chicago Review of Books was among those who blasted Simon and Schuster for giving Milo a $250,000 advance on the book last year. (The publisher eventually dropped Yiannopoulos, and the book was self-published.)
A heavily circulated recent Buzzfeed report illustrated how Milo incorporated ideas from the white-nationalist fringe into Breitbart while getting furtive support from some establishment media figures. The report also featured video of Yiannopoulus performing "America the Beautiful" at a Dallas karaoke as white nationalist Richard Spencer gave a Nazi salute.
Yiannopoulus infamously left Breitbart, in February, amid allegations that he had defended pedophilia. He was banned from Twitter las year after inciting his followers to harass comic actress Leslie Jones.
A so-called Free Speech Week event that was to feature Yiannopoulus at UC Berkeley was canceled last month, although Milo and other far-right figures did appear briefly at a plaza at the university in September. A few dozen people came to see him and it only lasted about 15 minutes. The school's chancellor, Carol Christ, characterized the aborted Week as "political theater" that was "designed to be a provocation to try and get us to cancel the event and then to get the news story that they wanted."
This post has been updated.