Trans in Hollywood: An industry insider discusses the state of transgender representation in film and TV

Like many of today’s trailblazing transgender activist-artists, Scott Turner Schofield wears many hats in Hollywood. As an actor, he became the first out trans man to earn an Emmy nomination, for Studio City; he’s written autobiographical shows for stage and screen, including Becoming A Man In 127 EASY Steps; he counts Billy Porter directorial debut Anything’s Possible and the upcoming Peacock slasher film They/Them among his producing credits; and he has consulted on the hit HBO drama Euphoria as well as The Craft: Legacy and Zombies 3.

It’s thanks to consultants like Schofield that Euphoria’s Hunter Schafer delivers a nuanced and authentic performance in a rare Hollywood depiction of transgender life; most other mainstream trans moments in pop culture fall on the latter side of good, bad, and ugly (the less said about Ace Ventura, the better). Of course, no one perspective can distill the unique experiences of a community as diverse as the one represented by the T in LGBTQ+. And that’s one of the points Schofield made recently when he sat down with The A.V. Club to weigh in on the state of queer storytelling and trans representation in film and television.

The A.V. Club: First things first, how do you and fellow transgender artist-activists classify your roles in Hollywood? What do you call yourselves?

Scott Turner Schofield: Just like names and pronouns, crediting is so important, and it’s up for debate right now. A lot of the work that we do is producing. Are we being under-credited by being called consultants? A consultant is used when you are, for example, doing a hospital show, and you have a doctor there who tells you how to pronounce the words and what would and wouldn’t happen in X or Y situation—and to a certain extent, that’s what we do. What I do starts with the creator, and it’s anywhere from really lengthy, in-depth conversations about nuanced points of view for characters or dialog—sometimes even as far as writing dialog or offering lines that end up being written. “Well, that character wouldn’t necessarily say this, but they might say something like this.” In that case, producing is definitely happening.

Then [there’s] being on set every day and being a resource to the director, to help ensure that trans bodies are being visually represented authentically. That’s costume, makeup, not falling into the visual tropes and insults that have come through the past decades of transphobic representation—like focusing on an Adam’s apple. We’re supporting them to create art, not further stereotype. And sometimes my job includes helping with the PR of the production, and helping people tell “the story of the story,” so that you’re talking about your trans actors or your trans creators in a respectful and accurate way that’s not just regurgitating the same stereotypes the media has passed on.

So the work I—and many others—do is deep and multifaceted, and deserves pay and credit that’s properly representative. I’m really not doing much work that isn’t credited under the producer category anymore.

AVC: Who are some of those other consultant types doing some or all of the above?

STS: Zackary Drucker is someone who’s really an established producer now. She’s very much in the storytelling zone, she’s even co-directed, her contribution to the story has been so prominent and important to the telling of the story. Then we have Tre’vell Anderson, who understands story from a journalist perspective and is coming in on The Proud Family, and they also work on Legendary—two very different interactions where they’re offering expertise that’s really important to the way that the story is being told. As far as actor-producers go, I’m in league with Laverne Cox, Jen Richards, Trace Lysette, Rain Valdez. We also have Dana Aliya Levinson, who acts, writes, and consults at GLAAD. JJ Maley is somebody who works in theater and is starting to transfer over into film and television. There are a number of people who are in the entertainment industry, focusing on trans representation. No one can use the excuse that “they can’t find anybody.”

AVC: Is one of the barriers to authentic trans storytelling the notion that one person from a minority background can speak to every experience of that minority? It seems that especially in the trans community, you can take 100 trans-identifying people and have 100 completely different stories or labels.

STS: One hundred percent. You cannot let a common label erase diverse experiences. This is tricky, because I generally stay away from black-and-white thinking. I really believe in “both, and.” But at this point, I think I’m just going to start explaining to [cis] people that I think there’s a difference in the way that we see the world that you cannot possibly understand. You can empathize with, you can accept, there’s lots of things you can do to support. But trans people bring something to a story that is just fundamentally different, if you let us, and it’s time to give us the means of production to show you. I promise it’s a good story!

But identity politics aside, what about trans people just telling stories, not necessarily even trans stories? Why is that still such a far-fetched idea for the mainstream?

Let’s look at The Matrix. The culture at large is still unpacking The Matrix. And it was created by trans women. They weren’t out yet, but the Wachowskis were trans women at that time, they knew that. The film was an allegory of their experience of being trans and transitioning in the world. And it is so much more to so many people. So there is that fundamental difference in perspective and way of viewing the world that creates something so wildly different. And it wasn’t about being trans, except that it was. But it wasn’t! But it was. You can’t peel those things off of each other. And you cannot deny how deeply, profoundly compelling they are to a very broad audience.

AVC: You run workshops for cis filmmakers—is the mainstream always going to be stuck on “trans 101” stuff? How optimistic are you about moving beyond that?

STS: We always need 101 stuff because, like you said, there’s my 101, white trans guy 101. But what about Muslim non-binary 101? Like, what about disabled trans 101? There’s so many iterations of the 101 that we can do and everybody needs that. I always say labels are really important in the moment when you need them. They are vital, they are lifesaving, they are life changing—and then they fade into the background.

So we have to go beyond the 101 because that’s what we do in life, too. And we have to get beyond transition narratives—because transition is like your adolescence. So it would be like telling the human condition through only stories about teenagers. If you gave us the means of production, if you allowed us access to the means of production and did not prescribe us to telling a coming out narrative, a transition story, if you just let us tell whatever stories we wanted to tell now, we’re in uncharted territory. That’s gold for storytelling, isn’t it?

AVC: You seem to really believe in the promise of Hollywood and the power of storytelling. Or is it more of a holding accountable?

STS: I want to hold Hollywood accountable to what we all know it can do, yeah. [The question becomes], when is this going to start happening for trans people and trans stories? I mean, you even look at Bros—Billy Eichner is an actor who has worked his way up, who has the “right,” quote unquote, to get things made, who has the bankability. And I’m super curious to see not just the short term gains of it, but the long term gains of it, for more of us in the LGBTQ+ communities.

I am paying a lot of attention to this idea of what people will get behind from a value perspective, from “Who’s going to pay for it?” Wouldn’t it be nice that if you had a credit on an eight-figure film, that then you just automatically get the funding to do another? Wouldn’t it be nice if it was a meritocracy like that? Because that’s where I am now, with They/Them. But it’s unlikely. It’s more likely that someone could say, “Who’s going to watch this and who’s going to care?” If you’re a minority, if you’re having a difficult experience that nobody wants to take responsibility for having created, your story is going to have a very hard time getting bankrolled in the same way as a story that doesn’t look at those things.

What that means is we’re missing the opportunity to have those incredible movies—Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner, as one example, these films that fundamentally change the way people see things in culture, these films that actually do the work that I came to Hollywood to do.

There’s this underground conversation that I’m having with people, in what we can call trans Hollywood, about how we just wish we could find a couple of millionaires or a billionaire who would bankroll a production company, where we would be free to make our work and free to contribute our perspective to culture without having to go to people who don’t understand it, are biased implicitly against it. If only. Imagine what that could do. But then the question comes down to, okay, then who would distribute it? The bottlenecks just keep appearing!

AVC: Is that such a fantasy? Is it naive or unrealistic to ask for that level of greenlighting?

STS: You can’t say to a Hollywood person, with a serious look on your face, “Don’t think about the bankability.” But in large part, I feel naive so often in the work that I do. Because I really mean it, we make magic here! Let’s make change. And people just look at you like, “Were you hit over the head?” At the same time, it’s not fantasy. Because my business case to folks is, look, we do know that the percentage of people who are identifying and who resonate with LGBTQ+ identities is growing and growing. And everyone who loves us, who wants us to be happy, will perform their allyship by watching. Think about how, when we got marriage equality, it was because 70% of Americans were like, “We want you to love who you want to love and be happy.” There is actually a huge market share of people who will support LGBTQ+ stories by watching them. We also know there are studies out there where—it’s something like, for every percentage of diversity, whether it’s racial or gender diversity, that you invest in, there are far greater percentage points reflecting measurable gains in profit.

But it’s like the establishment of Hollywood is so caught up in its own story, forgetting the magic that it has purveyed for decades. You get in this loop. It’s about numbers and tradition and what people want and what people will buy. It doesn’t matter that I’m sitting there telling them these facts from these studies. But that’s probably because they’re wondering which bathroom I go to and not listening to what I’m saying.. That happens all the time.

How optimistic are you about continuing to make these inroads? We have no choice but to hold onto earnest hope, right?

STS: Right. And that’s where I know that my probably most fundamental identity is that of an artist. I ask myself constantly, could I just do something else? Is there something that I could do that wouldn’t put my dignity and hopes and dreams on the chopping block every day? And I cannot imagine a different future for myself. This is what I was born to do. There’s nothing that’s more satisfying. The thing that brings me joy right now is how many trans and non-binary people are having success. For all the complaints that I have about it, there are so many success stories where people are showing up and getting cast and getting greenlit … Their success is my success. And also: Cis people are using their access and privilege to support trans stories in all kinds of ways—I see it in every production, in bigger and better ways all the time. The revolution for trans people is as collaborative as a movie about us is. We have so much room to grow and make new stories. So I definitely live in hope, and I’m not embarrassed to say it.