Gladiator for a night at the Colosseum? Some Romans are up in arms

ROME – It has probably been centuries since Romans have been so feverish about happenings at the Colosseum, and it is not because of the recent release of film-maker Ridley Scott’s 2024 Gladiator sequel.

A plan by the Colosseum and Airbnb to give a select few people the chance to unleash their “inner gladiator” at the most-visited site in Italy has caused an uproar among many Romans who say its demeans a treasured cultural icon.

Over two nights in May 2025, up to 32 people will learn the art of gladiator fighting at the ancient arena, taught by Roman history buffs who specialise in historical re-enactments.

The project is a partnership between the Colosseum Archaeological Park and accommodations booking platform Airbnb, which donated US$1.5 million (S$2 million) to spruce up a permanent exhibit inside the arena.

The aim, Airbnb said, “was to support the Colosseum’s ongoing conservation work to find new ways to inspire and educate visitors on the historical significance of this bygone era”.

But some Romans and cultural leaders have given the initiative an emphatic thumbs down.

“We’re against transforming the Colosseum into a theme park,” said Mr Massimiliano Smeriglio, a member of Rome’s City Council responsible for culture. He said he would meet Airbnb officials to try to get the company to change its mind.

“We’re all in favour if a company decides to sponsor a monument or a restoration,” he added, “but it shouldn’t be necessary to get anything in exchange.”

Mr Federico Mollicone, a lawmaker with the Brothers of Italy party of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, dismissed the criticism as the views of a “radical chic” element in Rome that treated the arena “as something sacred”.

The Colosseum, he pointed out, had been built for rough-and-tumble entertainment.

He added that gladiator games were tourist draws in other historical arenas, like one in Nimes, France.

“There’s nothing wrong with it,” said Mr Mollicone, whose centre-right government in 2024 passed a law that supports the promotion of historical re-enactments.

Critics also raised questions about Airbnb’s involvement at a time when many European cities are struggling to balance the needs of locals with a booming post-pandemic tourist industry facilitated by accommodation platforms.

“There should have been more sensitivity” on the part of the Colosseum, a national institution, “because Airbnb opened the way to the destruction of our communities”, said Ms Viviana Piccirilli Di Capua, coordinator of an association of residents in downtown Rome.

She added that numerous residents had said landlords were not renewing leases.

The iconic monument “always stirs up huge emotions and debates”, lamented an Airbnb spokesperson.

“Colosseum kitsch emergency,” Mr Massimiliano Tonelli, editorial director of an art magazine, wrote in a scornful editorial about the gladiator plan.

He said in an interview that Ars Dimicandi and Gruppo Storico Romano, the two historical re-enactment associations involved in the project, were unqualified, an assessment that has been dismissed by both groups and Colosseum officials.

Ars Dimicandi founder Dario Battaglia said that Gladiator (2000) and its sequel were part of the reason initiatives like those promoted at the Colosseum were so necessary – movies probably get much of the history wrong.

For example, he said, gladiators were not always forced to fight to the death and many were volunteers, including enslaved people hoping to improve their station in life.

“The Colosseum changed course and decided to commission the world’s leading experts in this field to provide clarity” because the profession of gladiators “is completely misunderstood”, he said.

So, the Airbnb event will be an “immersive experience” less about entertainment and more about history to show “for the first time what really happened”, he added. NYTIMES