Aria from Fig Trees (Canadian documentary opera on HIV & AIDS)

This is a video clip taken from the 2009 documentary opera film by Canadian director John Greyson titled Fig Trees. It follows the stories of AIDS activists Tim McCaskell in Toronto, Canada, and Zackie Achmat in Capetown, South Africa. The film is a blend of fantasy, surrealism, music, poetry, news footage, etc.!!

This clip tells the story of Zackie Achmat (played by Van Abrahams) who is unable to attend the 2002 Barcelona International AIDS conference because he is on an HIV treatment strike and too weak to travel. He sends his speech by video instead. The speech is sampled and transformed into an aria about Zackie's treatment strike.

Find out more about this extremely creative film here.

Find out more about Zackie Achmat and his treatment strike here.

To hear just the audio version, go here.

To watch another video clip from Fig Trees, go here.