Trans in Entertainment News — Trans Media Arts

Ah yes, the new year brings new entertainment. Transgender issues AND entertainment continue to be white-hot. Even in these trying political times, transgender people will not stop being creative and willing to entertain the masses. There is some great stuff going on recently, and this month is jam-packed with info.

Andi Dier

Rose McGowan, the former Charmed actress and Harvey Weinstein accuser, has a new book out called Brave. She has embarked on a book tour to promote the book. At a stop on her tour in NYC, local trans woman Andi Dier started to heckle her about her derogatory comments about trans women that McGowan made earlier this year. McGowan is notorious for being brutish and controversial. Dier was calling out Ms. McGowan for saying that trans women are not women. The incident turned into a shouting match with Dier being escorted out of the Barnes & Noble, and McGowan launching into an angry, unhinged tirade to the uncomfortable remaining audience members. Seems like Ms. McGowan needs to go away for a while and take a nice long rest. She seems very angry and tense. Ms. Dier on the other hand has been thrust into the spotlight and is being targeted by alt-right sources. McGowan has canceled her remaining book tour dates. Kudos to Andi Dier for speaking up for all of us and calling out McGowan’s TERF (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist) behavior.  The people in the white robes by the seaside await Rose!
[Get our contributor The Artist!’s take on the controversy here.]

https://youtu.be/L_Ko2895D2E

Candis Cayne

The ABC Show Grey’s Anatomy is turning into real boon for transgender actors and for the larger transgender community. Earlier the show had introduced a major character into the show who turns out to be a trans man. Casey, a new intern played by Alex Blue Davis, who identifies as a “proud trans man” will not be the lone trans person on the show. News has just come out that Candis Cayne, the trans actress of I Am Cait fame, will have a groundbreaking story arc about a transgender patient who comes to Grey Sloan Memorial Hospital to receive a cutting-edge vaginoplasty surgery. Cayne’s character arc is based on a true story. In real life, Jess Ting — the director of surgery at the Center for Transgender Medicine and Surgery at Mount Sinai — created this exact surgery with the help of a transgender woman named Hayley Anthony. According to the show’s producer Krista Vernoff, the surgery “revolutionizes the making of a vagina and we thought that was a really cool story and [Cayne] is playing a character inspired by something we read.” Good news for Candis and the community!!
Laverne Cox has made the cover of Cosmopolitan! While it was Cosmopolitan South Africa, it still is a major cover for her and represents good exposure for trans people and the community. The 45-year-old actress couldn’t have looked sexier on the February cover of Cosmo South Africa, making history as the first transgender woman to grace the cover of a Cosmopolitan magazine. Laverne still stars in the Netflix women’s prison drama Orange Is the New Black.

Daniela Vega

Oscar! Oscar! Trans people in the film business are being recognized by the Oscar committee. Yance Ford, the director of the documentary Strong Island and a trans man, became the first transgender filmmaker nominated for an Oscar. His film, a Netflix release about Ford’s investigation into his brother’s 1992 murder, was nominated for best documentary. Sebastian Lelio’s A Fantastic Woman, Chile’s Oscar entry, was also nominated for best foreign language film. It stars Daniela Vega, a trans actress, as a transgender singer mistreated in the aftermath of her boyfriend’s death. There’s an in-depth article about he making of A Fantastic Woman on the Rolling Stone website.

A conservative “family values” group is trying to rally mothers against the Scholastic Corporation for publishing children’s books that feature transgender themes. One Million Moms, an eye-roll inducing anti-LGBT group, is targeting Scholastic, one of the world’s largest publishers of children’s books. In a post on its website, One Million Moms took particular issue with George, a book intended for kids in grades 3 to 7. Written by the queer activist and author Alex Gino, George tells the story of a transgender fourth grader who hopes that by playing Charlotte of Charlotte’s Web in a school play, she can convince her teacher and parents of her true female identity.

Giuliana Farfalla

The German edition of Playboy magazine says it will feature a transgender model on its cover for the first time. A spokesperson for Playboy Germany said that putting Giuliana Farfalla on the cover was in line with Playboy founder Hugh Hefner’s tradition of being “resolutely opposed to all forms of exclusion and intolerance.” Giuliana was a contestant on Heidi Klum’s Germany’s Next Top Model.

Peppermint

RuPaul’s Drag Race veteran Peppermint is about to star on Broadway. The singer-actress, who was the runner-up on the show’s ninth season, is set to make history this summer as the first openly transgender woman to star in a Broadway musical. An Elizabethan Period romp, Head Over Heels, starring Peppermint, is loosely based on Philip Sidney’s 16th-century text, The Countess of Pembroke’s Arcadia. It also features music by The Go-Go’s, an ‘80s girl pop/rock band.

That’s all for now folks! Have a great February. Mardi Gras is heating up in New Orleans. There’s a new SuperBowl champion team. Punxy Phil saw his shadow, Valentine’s activities, President’s Day. . . etc, etc. Enjoy and see you in March!

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Tags: Alex Gino, Candis Cayne, Daniela Vega, featured, Giuliana Farfalla, news, Peppermint, Rose McGowen, Transgender

Category: Transgender Community News, Transgender Fun & Entertainment