SINCE THE 1979 ISLAMIC REVOLUTION in Iran, an estimated 4,000 people have been executed for the crime of lavaat, or sex between two men.

One particular execution captured the attention of R. Timothy Brady, a 21-year old music composition major at Emory University, while he was studying abroad in Italy during the summer of 2005. It was the case of Mahmoud Asgari, 17, and Ayaz Marhoni, 16, who were publicly hanged in Edalat Square on July 19, 2005, after they were accused of being lovers.

“I’m gay — that could happen to me,” Brady says. “It doesn’t matter that they’re Iranian or they’re half way across the world, it still really hit home.”

A year later, when choosing a topic for his senior honors project, the boys’ story still haunted Brady, and became his inspiration for the project, “Edalat Square: Opera in One Act.”


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Brady, who used to be more traditionally involved in GLBT activism, sees his opera as a form of activism.

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“I hope people will walk away being spiritually affected, not just emotionally, but I want something deeper,” he explains. Brady hopes that Asgari and Marhoni’s story will continue to live within the audience “long after the lights go down, long after the music is forgotten.”