Elliot Page Says He's 'Really Excited To Act' After Coming Out As Transgender
Elliot Page says he also wants to help advocate for the transgender community in any way he can
In his first interview since coming out as transgender, actor Elliot Page tells Time that he grew up feeling “like a boy” but had to “look a certain way” when it came to his acting career, which began at age 10. After coming out as trans three months ago, Page says he’s excited about his career and wants to use his platform to help advocate for the trans community.
Page admits he thought about quitting acting because of being forced to appear more feminine on-screen and when attending professional public events. Now, the Umbrella Academy star says he’s looking forward to the path his career will take.
“I’m really excited to act, now that I’m fully who I am, in this body,” Page told Time. “No matter the challenges and difficult moments of this, nothing amounts to getting to feel how I feel now.”
The Oscar-nominated star of Juno, Whip It, and Inception came out as trans in a heartfelt Instagram message last December.
“Hi friends, I want to share with you that I am trans, my pronouns are he/they and my name is Elliot. I feel lucky to be writing this. To be here. To have arrived at this place in my life,” he writes.
After coming out, Page says his manager received several offers from casting directors who said they’d be honored to cast Page in their next movie or project. He’s filming the third season of Netflix’s Umbrella Academy in Toronto right now. Page says the reaction to his coming out went exactly as he predicted it would.
“What I was anticipating was a lot of support and love and a massive amount of hatred and transphobia,” Page said in the interview. “That’s essentially what happened.”
Since coming out, Page has kept pretty quiet on social media. Now, Page says, he wants to help the transgender community by using his platform and privilege, to let other trans people know they’re not alone.
“Extremely influential people are spreading these myths and damaging rhetoric — every day you’re seeing our existence debated. Transgender people are so very real,” Page says.
He says during his childhood, he once asked his mom if he could “be [a boy] someday.” Specifically calling out the anti-trans legislation surrounding sports teams in schools, Page recounts being forced off a boys’ soccer team when he was a child.
“I would have been in that position as a kid,” he says. “It’s horrific.”
Throughout his career, Page would endure hardships relating to who he was on the inside conflicting with the characters he was portraying professionally. He said he found difficulty in “how to explain to people that even though [I was] an actor, just putting on a T-shirt cut for a woman would make me so unwell.”
After coming out to himself and then the public, things changed for him. “I was finally able to embrace being transgender and letting myself fully become who I am,” he said.
When it comes to helping fight for the transgender community in regard to discrimination, visibility, and acceptance, Page is fully committed.
“My privilege has allowed me to have resources to get through and to be where I am today, and of course I want to use that privilege and platform to help in the ways I can,” he told the magazine.
