Casting a woman as a transwoman

[Hazchem]

So there is a show about to air on the Australian ABC about Carlotta who is an incredibly well known and important entertainer in Australia. She Les Girls, was the first transexual in an Australian soap opera. An icon, someone whose very being has made changes to the Australian cultural landscape. She was original born male and very early on had surgery

So the person they have picked to play her is a ciswomen. Surely there was a trans actor who could have taken the role. My feeling is that a women has been cast because she can be sexy in the Les Girls numbers without making people feel uncomfortable about seeing her as sexy.

Am I over thinking this? Is it gender equality to have a ciswomen plan a transwomen?

I think I'm going around in circles here.

Dysfunctional, if you are accepting that a trans woman is a woman post and pre op, there is no male body. There is a woman's body.

If you are suggesting that the person had a penis and no breasts and then had no penis and breasts, then surely a. Jared Leto's penis isn't appearing in the film and b. a woman actor's breasts could be minimised to play the role in the earlier part, just as Jared Leto presumably had prosthetic breasts later in the film.

I think party of the problem is I'm not actually sure what I think. I know for sure my theoretical knowledge and consequently my language are probably not as up to the task of thinking/discussing what are complex issues.

I do think that gender is constructed.
That gender is also constructed on the bases of only two sexes and I think that is limiting.

I think trans women want to be part of the "category" of women.
That is uncomfortable for some ciswomen but mainly it is uncomfortable for men because they want to be able to able to have simple ideas about what women are and what they are meant for.

There is a market, but I think I saw something a bit different to that market. It was a working class straight karaoke bar in Blackpool ( that sounds really stereotypical, but it was). There is something camp about straight Northern culture that makes trans women who are very glammed up 'sexy' in the same way that other Northern women in similar clothes on a night out in Blackpool are.

It doesn't translate into other settings and other groups. It would be harder to be a 'sexy' trans librarian or a 'sexy' trans girl next door. People's expectation of sexy trans woman most closely fits with sexy Northern girl on a night out in Blackpool, so trans women are seen as less trans in that situation.

"Dysfunctional, if you are accepting that a trans woman is a woman post and pre op, there is no male body. There is a woman's body"

I think this is where i get confused. If you are already in a woman's body why would you need an OP. I thought it was the sex and gender being different that made them trans. Sorry if this offends anyone on here.

"There is something camp about straight Northern culture that makes trans women who are very glammed up 'sexy' in the same way that other Northern women in similar clothes on a night out in Blackpool are."

I see what you are saying and I'm visualizing the glamour model look here- a look I as a straight(ish) woman find very unsexy

I have the same confusion as Dysfunctional. Although I have seen new legislature that which might help in that Australia is now recoginsing gender as non binary as you can now be male or female or non gendered. While that isn't the complete answer and won;t work for everyone I think having more genders might help.

I've completed hijacked my own thread and am about to leave to get on with the rest of the day. Very poor form sorry.

Very interesting thread. Thanks Hazchem. Am off to bed myself.

Dysfunctional, kind of, yes. Although I'd say Essex is more glamour model and Northern is more camp. But both are such an extreme performance of a particular kind of femininity that it becomes a bit aesthetically irrelevant what kind of body the person doing the performance was born into.

I would have thought that the best actor to play a transwoman would be either a transwoman or a man, like Jared Leto, especially if the character is shown pre-transition. I saw the actor who plays Haley once and she looked very different from her character, much younger and less frumpy. I think the character would have been less acceptable to middle England if she had appeared more obviously trans.

A bit cheeky but can I ask about another casting choice? And I'm not even sure how I feel about it.

In The Runaway the character Desrae is played by Alan Cumming. The character is open about having a penis but dresses exclusively as a women. Wiki uses the term transvestite but I have a feeling we are meant to be stepping away from that. I'm just wondering if it would be more appropriate/correct to have a trans person play the role. Or is the whole point of the I am what gender I say I am mean that it shouldn't matter which gender the person playing any role is.

I'm sure I sounds like I'm goading or something it just I'm trying to feel out something which I think is complex and challenges how I see the world. Or I'm trying to challenge how I see the world because I come from a position of privilege in some area but at the same time feel the system is becoming harder and harder to be within.

Haz I'm not sure what you think your privilege is. I don't see any privilege in being born female. It is very appealing to feel that you have a position of privilege as it makes your life in patriarchal or structural hierarchy more bearable. That doesn't make it true, however. Some women feel comfortable with their position in patriarchy as being the most favoured or favoured enough of the oppressed, whether they want to recognise it or not. I think this is at the root of women's compliance with the patriarchal hierarchy, just as most men accept their social class because there is always someone below them, either another man or a woman.

I guess I think of my privilege in this context as being born into the gender I feel I am. I worry because i this I'll miss something that might be really important to transpeople because I don't fully understand how they experience the world.

They did this in My Family. Diana Weston (v mush a woman. And Robert Lindsay's ex) played Ben's friend Charlie who had been a (male) drinking buddy of student days.

Hazchem - By being born into the gender you feel you are, do you mean being born into the sex you feel you are i.e. you have a female body and don't think you are a man?

I don't see any privilege in being born female. - You can use public toilets. Less likely to be killed. Easier to get a job. Less likely to suffer from depression and try to kill yourself.

And very importantly you don't have people telling you all the time that you're not female.

Have you seen Elementary? The role of Ms Hudson in that - a transwoman - is played by Candis Cayne.

Surely how transgender people are portrayed is more important than by whom?

Wot Tiggy said. And Kim, obviously.

Can't remember that stats on transwomen being killed (my friend Roz frequently tells me) but they're quite, er, striking.

Calmet Yes that is what I meant, my body feels right for me although a little lumpier then I'd like.

SixImpossible Yes I think it's most important how trans people feel about trans casting. I did try and do some searches but couldn't find any responses. So I posted here because I know that there has been several threads about trans people lately and thought there might be some good insight.

Candis Cayne has a reasonable likeness to Carlotta.

There was a fuss recently about an Arcade Fire video. There were complaints that a man (Andrew Garfield) was playing a transgender woman. I think it turned out to be more or less one person with a big voice doing most of the complaining, and I believe the character wasn't necessarily transgender anyway. The Trans people I know were very "meh" about the whole thing.

Getting black actors to play black people shouldn't really be a problem as there are millions(guess) of good black actors. There are far fewer trans actors so sometimes you'll need to look further afield.

I'd rather have a good actor in a positive portrail of a trans person than a poor trans actor in some stereotypical crappy role.

Hazchem - I know being born a boy and wanting to be a girl, but must be difficult. But it is not a privilege to be born a girl.
Girls are treated inferior to boys in every culture in the world.