Justice Smith Is “Really Passionate” About Trans Actors Being Cast In Trans Roles

Following the profound impact of last year’s I Saw the TV Glow on LGBTQ audiences, Justice Smith is sharing some insight into his casting.

The actor noted that he’s “really passionate” about transgender people being able to play trans roles and tell their own stories onscreen, explaining why non-binary writer/director Jane Schoenbrun didn’t cast a trans actor as his character Owen in the A24 film, which is a metaphor for the trans experience.

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“I had some reservations at first, and I talked to Jane about this. I was curious as to why they didn’t cast a trans actor to play that role,” he said on the Zach Sang Show podcast. “But they made me understand how me, as a cis person, I’m being used as kind of a device for the structure of the movie. Because, spoiler alert, my character lives in this nightmare realm, and I am actually the girl from the other realm.”

Smith added, “So, it wouldn’t necessarily make sense if I was a trans actor, because the metaphor can’t really exist.”

Noting that the casting “was a big concern” of his, Smith said, “I’m really passionate about those kinds of politics and trans people being allowed to play trans characters. But I am also passionate about trans people telling their stories the way they want to tell them, you know. So that was a bigger priority for me.”

I Saw The TV Glow movie

In I Saw the TV Glow, teenager Maddy (Jack Haven) introduces classmate Owen (Smith) to her favorite show The Pink Opaque, which begins to alter his sense of reality as he discovers the show is actually a supernatural world beneath their own.

Smith said the experience filming the movies “was really beautiful,” noting many of the cast and crew were trans. “And that was kind of a queer haven,” he said.

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