Ahead of Trans Day of Visibility, which takes place this year on 31 March, Elliot Page sat down with leading trans activists to discuss visibility, ongoing anti-trans legislation, and celebrating trans joy.
Page joined writer Raquel Willis and ACLU attorney Chase Strangio on Instagram Live to commemorate the second annual Trans Week of Visibility and Action, where The Umbrella Academy star touched on what trans joy means to him.
“I feel the best I’ve ever felt,” Page began the discussion. “I feel the way I really never thought was possible.”
On Sunday evening, Page attended the 94th annual Academy Awards, where he walked the red carpet dressed in a classic black tuxedo. The actor revealed that this special moment was an example of accessing the trans joy he always felt was possible.
“It’s been on such a core level, this shift,” he said. “Just the degree now that I can feel present in a space without the incessant, underlying anxiety or some sort of feeling that I need to flee.”
“In the more specific ways, it’s wearing the Gucci suit last night [at the Oscars],” Page explained. “All those things are really special, wonderful, joyful moments where you’re looking at a photograph and it’s really cool to see yourself for the first time - the person you already saw but here they are finally emerging.”
Page reunited with his former Juno co-stars JK Simmons and Jennifer Garner at the Oscars ceremony on 27 March to present the award for Best Original Screenplay.
“Juno had me hooked from the very first page, and was completely infused with [screenwriter Diablo Cody’s] distinctive voice. It was unlike anything I’d ever read before,” said Page.
The actor was nominated for an Oscar in 2008 for his role as Juno, a teenager who becomes pregnant. Simmons played Juno’s father and Garner played a woman who agrees to adopt the baby.
Page also touched on the amount of misinformation that has been spread about the transgender community in the wake of anti-transgender laws being passed in the southern United States. Most recently, the “Don’t Say Gay” bill signed into Florida law that blocks classroom instruction on sexual orientation and gender identity, and the push from Texas lawmakers to treat gender-affirming medical care as “child abuse”.
“We’re tired of having to say: ‘Oh, no. I actually do exist,’” Page said. “The misinformation really affects people.”
Page came out publicly as transgender in December 2020. The Umbrella Academy actor revealed on Tuesday that his character in the hit Netflix series, Vanya Hargreeves, will also come out next season. Page’s character Vanya Hargreeves, who was written for the first two seasons (released in 2019 and 2020) as a cisgender woman, will be known henceforth as Viktor.
“Meet Viktor Hargreeves,” Page tweeted alongside an image of himself in The Umbrella Academy’s forthcoming third season.
