When Thomas Mann wrote Death in Venice, he envisioned an intimate drama unfolding amid the city’s decaying splendor. A century later, Jeff Bezos turned that same Venice into the stage for his own story — not a tragedy, but a lavish parade of superyachts, helicopters, red carpets, and street protests. Perhaps times have changed for the better. Or perhaps they haven’t changed at all — as The New York Times noted, Venice has long been a city of opulence.

This time, the melancholic writer was replaced by the most visible magnate of digital capitalism. And instead of a tale of silent obsession, the world witnessed a wedding brimming with noise, sequins, and controversy.

The marriage between Bezos, founder of Amazon, and Lauren Sánchez, a former TV anchor turned jet-set celebrity, began in scandal back in 2019 and culminated in June 2025 with a three-day extravaganza spread across multiple islands of the Venetian lagoon. The guest list included actresses, rappers, influencers, and even Ivanka Trump. Around 90 private jets and at least seven yachts were mobilized. Stages were erected over amphitheaters, desserts fit for nobility were baked, and the venues were heavily secured — including stops at the legendary Teatro Verde and the Borges Labyrinth.

Not everyone in Venice celebrated. Local grassroots groups staged protests, waved banners in St. Mark’s Square, and successfully pressured the city to cancel Bezos’s superyacht docking reservation. Their slogan — “No space for Bezos” — summed up the feeling that this wasn’t just another luxury event, but a symbol of a city reduced to a backdrop for the selfies of the ultra-wealthy. A late-capitalist theme park crying out for billionaires to pay more taxes.

The paradox is clear. Bezos embodies the speed of the digital age, instant deliveries, and the global platform economy. Venice stands for the opposite: fragility, history, and slowness. Its boats cannot compete with drones, and its small stores have languished under the weight of one-click convenience. And yet, the city was chosen not for its productivity, but for its timeless beauty.

For some, the wedding was an economic opportunity. Local authorities praised Bezos’s donations to conservation efforts and the financial windfall for hotels, suppliers, and historic pastry shops. “If I had a restaurant I should be happy to have Bezos at a table,” city official Simone Venturini told The New York Times. But others, like protest leader Tommaso Cacciari, were blunt: “It’s this conception of Venice that pushed all of its residents out,” he said. “To consider it not as a city but as a theme park.”

Lauren Sánchez, a third-generation Mexican American, has shared that she once thought she was “stupid” until a community college professor diagnosed her with dyslexia. Bezos, meanwhile, has reshaped his public persona — leaving behind the hunched-over engineer and emerging as a muscular playboy in dark glasses, owner of a $500 million megayacht, and promoter of space tourism. Their relationship has played out almost in real time on Instagram, featuring shirtless photos, massive engagement rings, and foam-filled yacht parties.

All of that arrived in Venice. But it didn’t arrive alone. It brought with it an uncomfortable question: Who does this city really belong to?

Bezos didn’t come to open a research center or fund a local tech hub. He came to celebrate. He did so in the same places where emperors once met with popes — now transformed into celebrity playgrounds. And while Venice was once built on commerce and grandeur, today it struggles to preserve something deeper than its façade: its soul.

As Reverend Stefano Visintin of San Giorgio Abbey told The New York Times, “He could have just got married in Beverly Hills.” But he chose Venice. And that choice — both symbolic and calculated — exposed a deeper tension between Europe’s cultural heritage and the growing power of the new global aristocracy: one of clicks, algorithms, and brand domination.

The wedding also struck a political chord. As The New York Times observed, “Mr. Bezos’ level of wealth and the couple’s Mar-a-Lago aesthetic defy the social-democratic ethic, and the taste, of many Europeans.” But more than anything, “Mr. Bezos’ cozying up to President Trump gave the wedding a political glare that set him apart from some Hollywood stars.” “We can’t say it’s a private wedding,” said Father Visintin. “These are political figures.”

For some local officials, however, the real contradiction lay in the protests themselves. Venice, they argued, has always welcomed all kinds of people. Luca Zaia, the president of the Veneto region, told The New York Times that the city had long embraced even those deemed “uncomfortable,” such as Galileo Galilei. “Venice is everyone’s,” he said, “even Jeff Bezos’.”

And so, in the very same place where Gustav von Aschenbach met his end in Mann’s fiction, the most iconic billionaire of the present celebrated his union with an over-the-top party.
It wasn’t Death in Venice. It was The Wedding in Venice.
And what a wedding it was.

Whit information from AFP