I just watched Girl Stroke Boy, have any of you seen that?ĭrew: It’s a British movie from the ’70s that is like a riff, I guess, on Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, but I think is actually a little bit sharper. Aside from that, everything was kind of new to me, but, yeah.ĭrew: Yeah. I’ve seen Boy… yeah, I’ve seen Boy Meets Girl.
But that’s a good list.Įva: I haven’t seen most of the things on that list. Rain: Yeah, there’s some bad ones from the ’80s and ’90s that I don’t want to list, but I think we talked a little bit about them on Disclosure. Rhys: I don’t know if people have seen that one. Have we seen these? Do we like these? I’ve seen and like Adam, I’ll say that right here, but how do we feel about this list? And did I forget anything? So, first, Adam, then Alice Júnior, Better Than Chocolate, Boy Meets Girl, Girl Stroke Boy, Holy Trinity, and Some Like It Hot. Maybe we can disagree about whether they should be considered rom-coms or trans, maybe I forgot things, but I just want to start off by listing them off. I put together a list of trans rom-coms that do exist. I’m really excited about this conversation because I love rom-coms and I love trans media and I love talking about how we need to improve both of those things.
She’s the writer and star of the 2019 rom-com web series Razor Tongue, and is currently in development on her directorial debut, a trans-led rom-com titled Relive: A Tale of an American Island Cheerleader.ĭrew: Hi, Rain.
She is an Emmy-nominated actress and filmmaker. She’s the star of Billy Porter’s upcoming directorial debut, which is a high school-set romantic comedy that’s set to be released later this year.ĭrew: Hi, Eva. Good to be here.ĭrew: Thanks for being here. Rhys: Hi, I wasn’t sure if I was on camera. He is an Emmy-nominated artist and filmmaker, the director of Adam, which premiered at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival and screened at NewFest, in addition to winning awards at Outfest, Oslo Fusion, the Mezipatra Film Festival, and was nominated for a 2020 GLAAD award. I’m just going to jump right in and introduce them. I’m so excited about this panel and our panelists. Now, it’s my pleasure to introduce the collaborator and the moderator for this conversation, a writer, critic, filmmaker, and co-host of the podcast Wait, Is This a Date?, Drew Gregory.ĭrew Gregory: Hi, everyone. We’d also like to thank our friends at Autostraddle for helping make this conversation possible. It’s my pleasure to welcome you to this virtual conversation, titled Where Are All the Trans Rom-Coms? with an esteemed panel of artists and filmmakers. This series is presented by NewFest and BAM. My name is Nick McCarthy and I’m the director of programming here at NewFest, New York’s leading LGBTQ+ film and media organization and one of the curators of Queering the Canon: Rom-Coms, running April 28th through May 2nd, both virtually nationwide, and at BAM in Brooklyn. Here is a Letterboxd list of all the films discussed in the chat. Rhys Ernst, Rain Valdez, and Eva Reign join me as we discuss the trans romcoms that do exist, what we’ve sought out in the absence of more, and what this lack says about society’s views of trans people. That’s why it was such a joy to moderate this panel as part of Newfest and BAM’s Queering the Romcom entitled “Where Are All the Trans Romcoms?” It’s time trans people get to showcase our desires, in all their variety, in all their complexity, in all their possibility.
And yet trans people have been largely absent from both - except as one-note jokes and villains. They are polar extremes - showcasing our greatest fears and our greatest desires. The two genres I enjoy working in most are horror and romcoms.