The Origin of Love;
Religion and Sexuality in Hedwig and the angry Inch

Hedwig and the angry inch is the story of an atheist transsexual punk rocker from Berlin, telling her life story as she tours America trying to capitalize on her new-found Tabloid fame. We learn about her botched sex-change operation / "Angry Inch", her nerdy christian ex-boyfriend - turned rockstar "Tommy Gnosis", and the search to find her "other half". One of the main plot points in this story is the introduction to Hedwigs original song "The Origin of Love" which is based on Plato's Symposium. It's the greek mythological story of how the God's separated us from our original bodies (Two-Headed, 4 armed, 4 legged being consisting of either male/male, female/female or a combination of both) as a punishment for showing strength and defiance towards the gods. The story says that we were all then thrown our into the world on our own to forever search for the other half we've been separated from.


Hedwig's counterpart Tommy Gnosis, derives his name from the later word "Gnosis", meaning knowledge. He takes his roots back to the old testament, were he explains to Hedwig his view of the Origin of love; God takes a rib from Adam to create Eve and she gives him the gift of knowledge by offering a bite of the forbidden apple. Both versions show that we were all once part of each other, so we naturally feel the need to be united with another person.