Transwimen actors call for trans quota quota for female roles

[GrumpyPanda]

.. more specifically, for 2 to 3 TW candidates to be united to every 20-strong audition.

And one of the interviewed, a mid-40s trans actor, complains about getting fewer offers of female roles, ostensibly since "coming out" aged 40. Who's going to tell the poor dear about Amy Schumer's genius sketch celebrating an actress' "last fuckable day"? Welcome to womanhood, "sister."

https://www.theguardian.com/stage/article/2024/may/02/just-let-us-audition-uk-transgender-actors-appeal-to-be-cast-in-non-trans-roles

I’m confused.
wasn’t it just yesterday they didn’t let others play them? Now, they want a quota off the women quota?

This is so predictable. The best women are… not the cervix havers.

This is a genuine question: how on earth are we expected to 'recognise' a character as non-binary.

Men, I understand; women, I get; men or women obviously dressing/presenting as (a stereotype of) the opposite sex, I see what they're driving at.

But what does somebody identifying as non-binary look like? I presume they would have to insert it prominently into the script, to tell the audience (before they yawn and think 'just get on with the play, will you'), which seems kind of odd and distracting.

You wouldn't have a character randomly telling you their favourite colour, or whether they prefer chips or jacket potatoes, or what kind of music they like, or what car they drive, or which bank they have an account with, or whether they have an iPhone or an Android, or where they do their shopping - unless any of this was actually somehow relevant to the character or play.

Aside from the fact that none of us is 'gender' binary inasmuch as we like/act/do ONLY things that stereotypical men or women would do; however we are, of course, binary when it comes to our biological sex, as we are humans and that is a basic immutable fact about humans.

I really am struggling to understand what people - real people as much as characters in a play or film - actually want us to say or do when they tell us they are non-binary. How are we meant to react, other than with a "That's nice for you, dear" - as we would when a 3yo tells us that they ARE Elsa, Fireman Sam, a crocodile or whatever?

I honestly don't know how we are meant to know for non-binary characters.

I am just catching up on Interior Design Masters. Female contestant, female name, female pronouns suddenly announces she is designing a room for trans and non-binary people as it was so important to her.

At the end she'd designed a room which basically looked like a normal not v well designed room. And I was none the wiser why she had done it.

Well someone like the person in billions -Tyler -I assume they are non binary as they are very androgynous with shaved head and wear more male Tailoring.

I can also note that the person is biologically female. The actor uses the then pronouns too.

”I am just catching up on Interior Design Masters. Female contestant, female name, female pronouns suddenly announces she is designing a room for trans and non-binary people as it was so important to her.”

I have long thought that we need to smash the gender binary of rooms. They are so heteronormative. And think of the non-binaries, forever stuck on the mezzanine. And JKR has too many rooms, which surprises no-one given her known transphobia.

Googled the actors who are pictured in the article and was easily able to find the heights of two of them, one is 5 foot 11 the other is 6 foot 1. How many actresses are that tall and how many actors would want to play opposite someone taller or the same height as them? Film and tv is still fairly wed to the man taller than woman norm and when the woman is taller its usually remarked upon, sometimes for their supposed mannishness like Brienne in Game of Thrones, I'm sure that would be considered transphobic if the woman was played by a trans woman.

In my googling I came across one of their instagrams and theres a story about the audition process/dating the lead actor of baby reindeer that others who have seen the series might find interesting https://www.instagram.com/p/C51Q_PdI5K4/?hl=en&img_index=1

I suppose they see this as a kind of blind casting. Like a black Anne Boleyn. We all see that the actress is black, and it does break the realism for a lot of people, but we are supposed to ignore it. Some people really don't mind this, or they don't mind it in certain types of productions.

But there is a group of people who will say that those who don't like that approach are basically racists, so tbh, theoretically these guys wanting this kind of casting are not asking something radically differernt in terms of the audience suspending disbelief. (Personally I think it is a bollocks accusation.)

I do think there is a slight differernce in that race categories are wholly constructed and can be invisible to those not socialized into seeing them, but sex is not like that. But arguably, we have been socialized in that way so the differernce is only in the abstract.

Personally, I generally prefer realistic casting in films, unless they are very much taking a non-realistic approach all round. But I'm also a purist about acting, I am happy for any role to go to any person who can convince me that they fit the part. I don't really care if that crosses race or sex, or uses make up or wigs or other actors tricks. Realistically though, it is tricky to appear convincing as someone you are not.

Always wondered if the non-binary implies that Emma Corrin really should have played Charles rather than Diana in The Crown. And if not, why not?

But the character (and/or actor who plays them) could be a butch lesbian or effeminate gay man, who presents and dresses in public in a way that doesn't fit with their 'normal' sex stereotype - but is under no illusions whatsoever as to what biological sex she/he is.

TRAs want to take us back to the time when there were no women on stage

Ha, we always said their ideology was regressive.

Or the gameskeeper in lady Chatterley's lover 😂

I identify as an 18year old 6ft3” super model

How very dare anyone suggest I am an overweight 5ft 3”pensioner

I am sure there loads of parts for in the Christmas pantomimes 😁

😁

I identified my pizza and cake dinner as salad and fruit but I still gained weight! It was like material reality counts for more than identity.
Shocked I was!

I have no issues with trans actors playing trans characters, or at least having a man playing a trans woman or woman playing a trans man.
Doing it the other way around just feeds the narrative that the majority of trans pass easily when that just isn't the case.

Walton Goggins did a great job in Sons of Anarchy. It was a male actor playing a pre op trans woman whose character was clearly female enough to be called she/her but not so perfectly passing. Also, the other characters were nice to her in that way we all are, when you 'know' but don't acknowledge because she was harmless - that was way more in keeping with my experience of trans people I've met.

Directors etc aren't stupid. They know we know.

Men pretending to be women want acting roles where they pretend they're not men pretending to be women.

"I see" said Wicked,but she didn't really.

There are plenty of roles where it doesn’t matter. All I ask is that people doing the casting exercise a bit of discretion where it does.

This is a bit of a Schrödinger’s cat question I suppose, but here goes. Would a monopedal trans actor applying for the role of Tarzan even make it to the casting room?

RIP Pete and Dud.

I think it is like the question “How do you know if someone is vegan?” “Don’t worry, they will tell you in the first three minutes.”

I rewatched SOA recently and he has a heavy 5 o'clock shadow, I don't think he was meant to pass. They wanted someone to make the blackmail photos extra "depraved." Great character though, I love the line "I'm the southern belle who don't tell"

Yes, in episode 1. Another guy used the pronoun "they" instead of "she" or "he".

The thing is, i just felt sorry for her. She's obviously a women pretending to be a man (moustache and boob surgery(?)). When everyone can clearly see she's a woman. Albeit a tall one.

There was a trans "woman" in that Netflix drama about Anna Delvey/Sorokin and he stood out a mile. He was fucking huge compared to the girls.

I always wondered about the conversations they have in the writing room. Surely, even mentioning this person is trans eg was male now female is transphobic, as they're supposed to pass and have all the issues an actual woman faces, including sexism, periods, childbirth...

In the Monster High film Frankenstein's monster (aka Frankie Stein) introduces themselves as having they/them pronouns, which I thought was meant to be a witty joke, but apparently the character is actually supposed to be non-binary. Confusingly the actor playing Frankie is a transman, but the character presents very much as typically feminine

Rebecca Root was in The Rising (which I really enjoyed) playing a very deep-voiced policewoman, but it wasn't clear whether the character was supposed to be trans, or a biological female. To be fair it wasn't essential to the plot either way.

It always grates on me in Billions that Ax and his finance bros always obligingly refer to Taylor as "they/them" even in their absence 🙄