[ SECRET POST #5194 ]

[case]

⌈ Secret Post #5194 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.


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08. [SPOILERS for The Last Book in the Universe]



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09. [SPOILERS for The Penthouse 2]



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10. [WARNING for mention of sexual assault]



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11. [WARNING for mention of dubcon]



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12. [WARNING for mention of rape]



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13. [WARNING for mention of noncon/underage shipping]































Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 00 pages, 00 secrets from Secret Submission Post #743.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Comments

[fscom]

03. https://i.imgur.com/PfG7V2e.png

[(Anonymous)]

I'm confused

OP seems to interpret the quote as saying that Page would be uncomfortable performing in female roles as an actor. Like OP's point seems to be, why would Page feel more uncomfortable playing a female role as opposed to playing a dragon, or whatever.

But it seems to me that Page is saying that he felt uncomfortable playing the part of, and being perceived as, a woman in everyday life, in his own person and in public perception of him as a person. And that seems like a totally different thing than what OP is talking about - it's quite different to have people perceive you a certain way in an acting role compared to perceiving you that way in real life. Even an actor doesn't necessarily want to be playing a role all the time.

Idk maybe I'm missing something but I feel like OP's point doesn't add up for me

[akacat]

Yeah. I’m wondering if Elliot was talking about publicity appearances and such?

Though even if it’s not, it might be very different for a newly out/transitioned trans man to play a female character, than for an AMAB guy who knows people default to seeing him as a man.

[(Anonymous)]

he seems to be saying "people get confused over why it was difficult for me to wear even simple women's clothing in my everyday life despite that i am an actor"

which makes perfect sense, you can be okay with doing something as part of acting but not as part of your everyday life, obviously

[(Anonymous)]

And even if he was also talking about playing a woman in a role, at the time it probably was hard for him not to see it has a reminder that he had to also pretend to be a woman out of the set. I also think that for actors/actresses in the closet, playing the roles of their assumed gender/sexual and/or romantic orientations even on screen/on the stage could be harder, on a personal level not on an acting one, than other types of role. Again, because it's an echo of what they "have to" do in their real life.

[(Anonymous)]

Just because they can act doesn't mean it won't give them horrible dismorphia. No one is getting fucking dismorphia from playing a wizard.

[(Anonymous)]

this. it's not playing a part of something you're not, whether he was talking about a role or talking about real life either way. it's far more complicated and the problem is, trying to explain this to someone who can't fathom how trans identity works or dysphoria works often ends up exactly like this. some of us just give up trying to explain.

[(Anonymous)]

What's hard to understand about that? He was experiencing dysphoria, and not even being an actor could help him overcome it. I can do my job relatively well most days, but if I had a condition that got in the way of my well-being, I would struggle.

[(Anonymous)]

Nah I side eye that as well.
EP was already a big enough name to go do theatre as Hamlet in drag if he'd really wanted to. It just wouldn't pay as well and he knew it.

If you take big female roles for the money, complaining about how hard you found it isn't going to get my sympathy.

It's on par with dudes doing action movies complaining about having to work out all the time.

Dry your tears with your millions, please.

[(Anonymous)]

One, dysphoria is still shitty if you're rich

Two, why are you assuming that Page is talking about playing female roles and not talking about being wrongly perceived as a woman in general? Is their context from the interview I'm not aware of?

And three, the kind of stuff Hollywood demands from action stars is shitty (albeit less shitty than the shitty demands the system exacts from other people) so the analogy also doesn't work

[(Anonymous)]

What it actually made me think of was Amanda Bynes talking about She's The Man giving her serious gender dysphoria. For those who don't know, she's a ciswoman who played a boy for a whacky Shakespearean teen comedy, and just the experience of seeing herself as a (not very convincing, for comedy purposes) boy freaked her out and triggered a lot of issues about her body.

[(Anonymous)]

Well, acting isn’t always a high-paying job. Elliot Page probably gets paid a good chunk of change now, but many actors have to work other jobs to make ends meet. He may have been the same.

As for the shirt thing, I’m guessing his dysphoria was just that bad.

[(Anonymous)]

I think if you replace "trans" with "gay" in here, you'd realize how bad this sounds. If a gay actor says he felt bad every time he had to pretend to be straight, would you also reply with "but you're an actor, acting is what you do?"

'Cause it's not like gay, trans, or even cishet male roles that would accept a trans actor are plentiful...

[tabaqui]

Not really?
It's one thing to be asked to portray another gender when you're comfortable in your cis gender.

It's entirely another to be asked to 'go back', so to speak, into that skin you were so uncomfortable and so unhappy in, and pretend that that is you, all over again, for hours and days and weeks.

I can see how that would be extremely hard for many transgender actors. I know that the pre-op and pre-'living as' scenes for Sophia (Laverne Cox) were played by her brother, so as not to make her have to go through that.

[(Anonymous)]

Getting your disphoria triggered has nothing to do with acting skills.

Playing a wizard: Acting to be a human who has magical powers. Once playing the role ends, you're no longer a wizard, cool.
Getting styled as a woman, having to wear clothes putting focus on the female form: Having a reminder you're stuck in the wrong body. And you won't get out of it once acting the role has ended.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm a closested transman. I'm out online, and wear jeans/hoodies at home, but with everyone else I have to remember to act at least gender-neutrally if not feminine. I don't really suffer from body dysphoria though, unless I'm wearing clothing that emphasises certain... attributes.

I don't mind having to do it occasionally (lockdown has been amazing), but having to do it *EVERY DAY* grates so much. Even having to do it two or three times a week now seems like a massive chore. It's not traumatic, or stressful it's just... Like having to spend the extra time getting ready for an important meeting vs throwing on some jeans and sneakers to go the grocery store.

I can totally see how it got to that stage for Elliot, especially not really ever being able to leave the house without a camera on you, but I wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't mind playing either role in the future, especially if it's a role for an LGBT demographic.

[(Anonymous)]

What you're describing is logical, yeah. But that sick feeling in your stomach has nothing to do with logic. It has to do with associations.

[(Anonymous)]

I can understand it being upsetting. I don't think it's unreasonable for it to make EP uncomfortable. But I also don't think this is a situation where the film industry was doing something wrong. There's nothing wrong with expecting the actor you cast to look the part they were cast for. Within reason, of course, but "tight t-shirt" is not exactly an extreme ask. If that's not something the actor is up for, then they need to be aware of that beforehand and not go out for the part. As an actor, you don't go out for a particular role, and then expect to be handled with kid gloves when something extremely basic that was obviously part of the job from the start is difficult for you. Sure, a basic level of sensitivity is nice. But everybody is busy doing their own job and may not have the time or energy to care about your struggle. They just need you to put on the t-shirt and do the scene.

So if the argument here is that Hollywood needs to be more open to casting FtM actors as men, and MtF actors as women, so they don't have to take triggering roles playing the sex they were born in, then yeah, I agree.

But if the argument is that productions are insensitive of how hard it can be for trans actors to play the wrong gender, then eh, I really think that's an issue that the actor needs to be proactive in managing for themselves.

[(Anonymous)]

YTA

[(Anonymous)]

This makes me wish that there were more androgynously-dressed characters, or more where gender is pretty irrelevant. Like Ripley in Alien, to give one example, or most male gangsters. Granted, the mob (mobs, really) are pretty patriarchal in reality, but there's not really a reason why a cleaner in a movie with crime stuff like Harvey Keitel in Pulp Fiction had to be a man.

Sorry, this diverged from clothes to complaining about gender roles of characters, haha, though it would mean more roles for non gender-conforming people, too, probably. I'm not trans but it bugs the shit out of me how gendered roles are in so many things.

[meadowphoenix]

....you have regular actors going into deep depression from getting into the head of intense characters, and you're confused about why Elliott might not want to play a woman anymore? psychology doesn't make logical distinctions of reality like that.

it's a mindfuck for some people to play roles that require minkfuck-y introspection, and it's worse when the part is a role you've already played that may have damaged you mentally. someone who went to jail for a long time might not want to play a prisoner for that reason.

[(Anonymous)]

I'm glad he felt comfortable enough to come out but good grief that is the worst haircut.

[(Anonymous)]

So, here's an example that doesn't rely on the OP understanding anything about trans people. I'm a cancer survivor. I work in healthcare. Most of the time, this doesn't bother me (and in fact having had cancer is part of what made me want to work there). But sometimes, when a patient's situation brings back bad memories of what happened to me - usually when they're being ignored or treated badly - and then being at work is triggering and awful. Not anyone's fault, just an intersection of my personal trauma and my work.

Elliot acting female for roles is the same - sometimes just acting, sometimes a reminder of what was going on with their own life. Even if the whole idea of acting someone you're not was the point of being there.

[(Anonymous)]

if it was a survivor talking about how hard it was to play r*pe scenes, would that still confuse you? it's just acting after all


you're just a douchebag

[(Anonymous)]

Don't know if I misunderstood you or if you misunderstoof EP or both, but I frankly think you need to need some serious mental resilience to become an actor. This isn't only about him, but about all kinds of people who get into acting and then crack when they have to play some demanding role, whether it be a man playing a woman or vice versa, rape victims, alcoholics etc etc. Like, you seriously need to consider your priorities and get some mental training.

As for people trying to cuddle up actors...yeah, no. It's their job. A lot of them are freelancers and they don't really get to choose, at least in the beginning. I feel like a lot of online kids nowadays behave spoiled as fuck, not to mention that this is -acting-.