Theo Germaine Just Wants to Be
Theo Germaine in conversation with writer, director, and advocate Janet Mock
The past couple of years have been a whirlwind for Theo Germaine. One day, Theo was clocking into shifts at a Chicago coffee shop when their agent told them about a new Ryan Murphy show. Just a few days later and Theo scored the role of James Sullivan, the calculated campaign strategist on The Politician, a Netflix series about a cutthroat high school student government election. The actor would be trading in perfecting latte art for donning signature preppy neckties and plotting world domination alongside costar Ben Platt (Dear Evan Hansen).
Charming, thoughtful, and modest, 2019 put Theo in the spotlight thanks to their work in The Politician and the extremely queer Showtime comedy Work in Progress. Theo, who is nonbinary and uses they/them and he/him pronouns, has also become a champion for trans visibility and inclusivity in Hollywood. While busy filming the second season of The Politician, Theo and entertainment virtuoso Janet Mock, who directed Theo in The Politician, hopped on the phone to discuss their first television gig, trans representation, career aspirations, and more, all while having a laugh. —Gabe Bergado
Janet Mock: You must be in New York right now, filming season two. How has that been?
Theo Germaine: It's been really good so far. Last year, I was terrified every day at work because I was so new. Now I have one season of the show down, and I'm just used to being on a set, and I'm just not as freaked out as I used to be. I feel a lot more confident.
JM: So you go out for the role of James. How did the part speak to you? Was there any kind of consideration about his identity?
TG: This is really simple, but I was enthralled by just reading the sides and being like, Oh, he's just a high school student and he's at work. Another scene that I taped, which was a scene that didn't make it into the show, was between him and Alice where he's the other man. I was like, I get to be the other man.. Oh, my God, that's amazing. It just was automatically like, Wow, I have not been able to do this yet.
JM: That must’ve been revelatory. You probably never saw yourself, a transmasculine actor, in a mainstream project playing something sexy like “the other man,” as well as the brain and the strategist.
TG: I remember talking to you last year when we were filming and being like, "Is it OK that they're not talking about his gender identity?" And you were like, "Yes." I am so used to preparing myself to fit a certain archetype that I realized last year that I didn't know how to separate it from myself sometimes.
JM: That must be one of the reasons why you wanted to act in the first place, to play characters outside yourself a little bit, to go into someone else's world?
TG: Right, within reason and within my boundaries. Acting allows me to live multiple lives at the same time and travel through different worlds. I like being a lot of different people.
JM: What’s the freedom that James provides for you?
TG: He's like me, but he does not face these things that I face in my real life, which is he never gets misgendered in the show. He's just a he, that's it. People are always like, "I don't know what gender that person is." He looks like me — I am small and not the most masculine-looking person, but men can be all different kinds of people. It feels like it's filling this sort of gap or fantasy that I didn't get to experience, because of my conditioning and the gender that I was assigned at birth. He's kind of like what would it look like if stuff had been different for me growing up.
I do a lot of work that's very fantastical, and I have a background in theater. I usually play magical characters. Sometimes I've been cast as the best friend who's the nonbinary, gender-fluid unicorn. James is totally the opposite. He is not the most exciting character in the show, which is really exciting. Something magical is that he gets to just be. It's sad that it is "revolutionary" that an actor who has my gender identity just gets to be, because everybody should just get to be.
JM: There's already a limited representation of trans men, particularly, and trans people in general. Were there images growing up that allowed you to see yourself?
TG: There's not, and that's why it's interesting to play him because there's so much that I have to think about. What is masculinity in this universe? What is his conditioning? There's so many experiences, role models, and examples I didn't have that it kind of felt like this empty map at times. I didn't meet another trans person until I was 19. I grew up in a very small town. I went most of my teenage life being like, Wow, you're going to have to be a secret. It's a very interesting first TV role to play because it's still kind of unknown for me.
JM: You're providing one of the very few representations of transmasculinity, even if audiences don't read you that way. Do you remember the first time you saw, maybe, a semblance or fraction of yourself onscreen?
TG: Honestly, the first moment that I think that happened was when I saw the first Harry Potter movie in theaters. This is not something that is trans at all, but I remember all of the 11-year-olds being [like], Oh, we got our letters and we're special and we get to go to a special school where people will cater to our special skills. I was like, I think I'm different and I think I need some help, but people don't know how to help me. It was this magical franchise that was the first thing that made me be like, Oh, wow, I just want to be a boy who could go to a magic school.
JM: That makes complete sense to me because I felt first fully seen watching My So Called Life with Claire Danes. I felt that I was Angela Chase. What pulled me to her was the fact that she was so open about her feelings, and she was so angsty, and she was a protagonist who wanted to find herself and find love.
TG: The second thing was, another fantastical reference, was watching The Fellowship of the Ring because the hobbits were tiny, pretty men. I was like, Oh, I want to be a tiny, pretty man when I grow up. It’s actually kind of hard to think of the first trans actor onscreen. It might’ve just been Laverne Cox in *Orange Is the New Black.* But by then I was more comfortable and out. I had access to books and was in college. There were more people like me, and I was, Oh, gosh, I'm not an abomination. Everything's fine. I worked at my college’s LGBT resource center when she came. She was doing college tours and speeches, and we chatted a little bit. She was very encouraging and talked about finding your side hustles and how to survive trying to make it in the entertainment industry.
JM: In your wildest dreams, what does your career look like?
TG: Definitely want The Politician to get through all of its seasons, however many it wants to have, and I want to be in all of them. I always want to be acting and have work. I want to keep doing stuff that is in the realm of reality, but I’m also very interested in the fantastic and science fiction. I want to get into film, not just television. More specifically, I want to be part of creating that content. I’ve been writing and trying to shadow at least one of the directors on season two because basically I want to do everything. I know that I’m having a lot of good fortune now, but there was an article that was released recently about how, despite a lot of these trans actors having success, a lot of people are still out of work and struggling to pay bills.
I would love to, eventually, honestly, be in your position. I want to get my own TV deal someday. I want to write content because I am tired of trans people not having enough work. I want to write mainstream content that puts trans actors into these real worlds in a normalizing way. I want somebody to be a nurse or a mother or grandparent or villain or the other man and not just have it be like, Let’s get this trans person in this thing because we’re so edgy.
JM: You know my favorite scene to direct you in was the one where James is caught by Payton in his girlfriend Alice’s bed.
TG: Naughty!
JM: What a way to start working together. You in a bed with the girl that’s not only the ideal girl, but your best friend’s girl. The scandal of it all.
TG: I also remember there was a day working with the twins and you being like, “Theo, these two are new to this, so I’m relying on you.” I smiled, and said, “Yes, Janet.” But in my head I was like, I don’t know what I’m doing! I’m a baby! It was really funny. I was honored that you were putting so much trust in me.
JM: Where do we find James in season two without giving too much away?
TG: Season one, he was totally focused on work and the campaign, so much that he wasn’t even questioning anything about himself. He is struggling a little more to work and also be a human being. He’s very angsty, which is funny, frustrated with everything. Not just in a work sense, but in a life sense.
JM: You mentioned earlier that there are boundaries that you set up for yourself when it comes to choosing characters. What are they?
TG: Oh, I mean, I’m a white person. I’m not going to play anybody who’s not white. That’s basically my boundary.
JM: Where are you at right now? Are you shooting today?
TG: I’m calling from a squash court in Westchester because I have to take lessons for something in the show. A lot of people I’ve talked to are like, “Wow, this really reminds me of my high school experience.” I’m just, “I grew up in the country. There was football, gender roles, and corn.”
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