Lesbian, queer promoters say pattern of unprofessionalism, exclusion by Montreal Pride has driven them away
Contract breaches, snubs and mishandling of abuse claim among allegations made in recent years
Getting contacted by Fierté Montréal to put on its biggest lesbian-centred party was supposed to be a leap forward for Lucia Winter and the budding event collective she had co-founded.
Instead, she said the months-long collaboration in 2023 left her feeling burnt out, disillusioned and insulted.
At first, the signs she described as red flags — slow communication, delays in getting a contract signed — seemed symptomatic of working with a large organization that's simultaneously collaborating with hundreds of other artists and promoters.
But then, after months of working with what she calls a vague budget, Winter said Fierté told her it had run out of money and could no longer cover an artist's flight, supplying a Via Rail coupon instead. Then, she said Fierté told her its graphic design team couldn't create the material it had promised.
"I was dealing with Fierté and the immense stress of that and around mid-July … I just burnt out and I quit my [full-time film industry] job," said Winter, the creative and technical director for MESSY which, at the time, was known as ElleLui.
During the actual festival, MESSY had to make amends with its artists for a number of issues it blames Fierté for. One couldn't get into their hotel room because MESSY says Fierté hadn't left a card on file. Others dealt with faulty equipment on set and one had to crash on Winter's couch after a flight cancellation because Fierté couldn't find alternative accommodation, she says.
At the end of the process, she says she had to argue with Fierté's director of programming, Chris Ngabonziza, over the validity of MESSY's producer's fee, which she says had been part of their contract all along.
"We did so much more than what was agreed on, and now you're asking us to not get paid what you agreed to pay us, and you're telling us that we didn't bring that much to this event," said MESSY co-founder Ray Resvick, referring to Ngabonziza.
In the spring of 2025, MESSY banded with nine other community groups and collectives all operating in the lesbian space and signed an open letter calling out Fierté for its behaviour.
At a moment when Fierté is mired in controversy over its stance on the Israel-Gaza war, some collectives say the issues run deeper than lack of representation.
"Even if collectives walk away and say, you know, I don't think you represent me [but] we were paid fairly, we were treated professionally and it was a work experience. But you're not doing either," said Resvick.
'Like pulling teeth'
CBC has heard from other signatories who have shared similar allegations to MESSY's against Fierté Montréal.
In one case, Fierté never materialized a contract for Voulez-Vous Productions' annual drag king workshop, according to its co-founder, despite saying it would go ahead in 2024.
It cancelled the collaboration just over a month before the festival kick-off because it couldn't finance the event, said Avery Burrow, reading from an email she received from Fierté, which CBC has reviewed.
Having already promised their artist a gig, Voulez-Vous ended up organizing the event out of its own pocket in September, incurring a deficit.
In an open letter written in February 2025, Fierté's executive director Simon Gamache said the organization has "been in the red for quite some time" and, for the last two years, has been following a strict financial recovery plan.
It manages a budget of just over $7 million, according to the letter, but Burrow questions how the money is spent.
From her experience working as a backstage manager for Fierté in 2023, she says a single drag performer can cost around $3,000 for a show.
Yet, she says, Voulez-Vous and two other promoters were given a combined artistic budget of $5,000 to hire 15 artists, including an international headlining DJ and dancers, to pull off Fierté's main lesbian club night last year.
"It's completely insane," said Burrow. They booked a local DJ in the end.
Fierté covered the venue and was supposed to provide a "copious communications strategy," according to Burrow, but she says the organization fell short on the second part of the deal, saying their graphic design team had no more capacity.
Burrow says Fierté didn't promote the event as contractually required and was unwilling to negotiate on the price of tickets.
In the end, Voulez-Vous and the other promoters say they were forced to sell almost 60 per cent of tickets within the last 24 hours leading up to the event.
That was only possible thanks to a discount code Fierté gave them at the last minute, Burrow says, adding it wasn't even about the money at that point.
"It was like, that's going to ruin our reputation."
She says the entire process "was like pulling teeth."
"We did hours and hours of work, of programming, of negotiations, of communications, of like graphic design, of making reels," said Burrow. "Fierté did not support us, even a little bit, on the comms."
In an interview with CBC, Fierté Montréal's new chair of the board of directors, Marlot Marleau, acknowledged the organization hasn't been perfect, saying some of the issues raised came down to miscommunication.
They said over the last two years, Fierté has been reviewing how it formulates its contracts with organizations so expectations are clear and set ahead of time before any production effort gets underway.
"So during that transition, I know there has been mishaps or there has been situations, but since then we have corrected those," they said.
Alleged mishandling of abuse claim
Longtime event producer Carolina Montrose says her six-year partnership with Fierté came to an abrupt end in 2023.
That year, she says Fierté pulled her event from its program just two months before it took place, leaving Montrose on the hook for the hotel rooms she says Fierté had told her it would cover.
Two weeks before Fierté's decision, she had escalated a personal issue to executive director Gamache, according to an email viewed by CBC. Fierté had booked someone she alleges had physically abused her — someone that she says had been banned by the previous administration.
"I just didn't feel safe working, you know, around my abuser … knowing that she might be there," said Montrose.
In a text exchange viewed by CBC, when Montrose first confronted Ngabonziza about this issue and showed him video of a particular incident, he replied by mentioning the exact year it had happened — a detail he said he learned by speaking directly with the individual in question.
Montrose says she was "completely in shock."
"That is the most insane, I mean, reaction to such a delicate situation that I've ever seen."
"Because … they said my name to my abuser, that gave my abuser the right – the power – to send me a cease and desist asking that I stop sharing the video."
Montrose says she received the letter on the day of her wedding, dressed in her gown.
Despite Fierté's assertion to the contrary, she believes the organization pulling her event was its way of resolving the issue.
According to emails viewed by CBC, the official explanation was that Montrose hadn't paid a fee to be part of the programming, though she says the fee was waived months ago.
Marleau said retaliation is not Fierté's style, and though they joined the organization at the end of 2023, they said they doubt the cancellation was in bad faith.
Regarding the ban — it wasn't well documented, said Marleau.
"We wanted to change that … so that [when] a situation occurs that people shouldn't be in our space, that we keep and have track of these, even if there's like a change of things, change of personnel," they said.
Fierté says internal inquiry launched
Fierté said an internal inquiry was launched in April 2025 pertaining to multiple concerns raised by internal and external parties.
The organization said it invited all parties that raised concerns to participate in the inquiry, including MESSY, Voulez-Vous and Montrose. Only Montrose was able to participate.
She calls the result of that inquiry — a streamlined complaints system to be made public this fall, per a Fierté statement — "laughable."
"Nobody's job has been at risk," she said.
Marleau said Fierté is putting the focus on bettering its processes rather than "putting the centre of attention on one person."
"I don't think it's public information to share the disciplinary process that could happen to one individual or one employee," they said.
Part of the recommendations that came out of that inquiry also include requiring that artists comply with non-violence and harassment policies and "to take appropriate action" when an artist is suspected of having committed a "serious wrongdoing related to Fierté Montréal's mission," says the organization's statement.
For Winter, Resvick, Burrow and Montrose, they feel lesbian events rank lower on Fierté's list of priorities and that their experience is a direct result of that.
Yet Pride wouldn't be what it is without the work they do year-round on the ground, building community, said Burrow.
"I think that there's also a big element of tokenizing in it. You book collectives to be able to like cross off boxes on the LGBTQ list."
Marleau says that isn't the case.
"Our focus is to better ourselves, it's not to discriminate against the lesbian space or collectives… it's sad to me [that's] their impression."
For MESSY co-founders, Winter and Resvick, there's a clear conflict between Fierté's aspirations of growth and what it initially set out to do.
"You're not just a regular festival. You're claiming to support extremely marginalized people," said Resvick.
"You can act like a regular festival and that's why everybody's calling you out, or you can act like a part of a community."
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