Blue is, blue does: A performance about truvada in several interactions

Abstract

Unpacking cultural and political understandings of Truvada-a little blue pill that serves as the first chemical Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) against HIV, and considering the sexual politics it has been enacting since its approval, this essay contains a close reading of the solo performance Blue Is, Blue Does. With the aim of denaturalising positivistic grand narratives in epidemiology and public health that disregard Truvada's contested status, the performance explores a variety of stories that are told when the blue pill-as a performative agent-is leading the narrative, including: world-making capacities of the feeling of blue enacted by AIDS-related atrocities, restricted access to PrEP due to systemic inequalities, renewed sexual ecstasies, the formation of Truvada-mediated subjectivities and the medicalisation of the homosexual body.