Something Special (Willy/Milly) | Jenni Olson, Rhys Ernst

[Brendon Lucas] Hi, good evening. Welcome to the Billy Wilder Theater, the home of public programs for the UCLA Film & Television Archive. My name is Brendan Lucas (he/him/his) and I'm the Legacy Project Manager for the Outfest UCLA Legacy Project, which is the only program of its kind in the world dedicated to the preservation of LGBTQ moving images. We're a joint effort between Outfest, which is one of the oldest LGBTQ film festivals in the world and I'm told it's the second longest continuously running film festival  in Los Angeles which is incredible, and between us and UCLA Film & Television Archive, our host for  this evening, which houses the Legacy Collection which is a repository of over 40,000 items that are safely housed at the Archive's home in Santa Clarita. We're so proud to have tonight's Legacy Project screening of "Something Special" a.k.a. "Willy/Milly" among an incredible new calendar of  programming for October through December, which includes the Taiwan Biennial, a tribute to the distribution company Strand Releasing, which if any of you are fans of queer cinema, you will know. They're celebrating 30 years this year and Marcus Hu and Jon Gerrans are scheduled to appear for a conversation as well as a retrospective for one night. There's a 40-year survey of student filmmaking at UCLA, a retrospective of the works of Julia Reichert, and a tribute to Jonas Mekas. So there's a lot of exciting stuff happening in the calendar. You should grab one on your way out. So thanks as always to the Archive's programming team, Paul and K.J., as well as to the UCLA Film & Television Archive staff for making sure that this and every Legacy Project archival screening is a success. So thank you very much. I'm, I'm very pleased that all of you could join  us for tonight's screening of "Something Special". It's a rather unique film that we're excited to have- screen as part of the Legacy screening series here at UCLA Film & Television Archive and tonight we welcome two very special guests to share this film. And we will invite them to share their thoughts on their, their choice to guest program this kind of rare and unusual film but one that we think is important. So when we're surveying the history of LGBTQ film  history it's, it's rare to find a feature-length story or feature-length film where trans experience is centered. And if it's featured at all, it's even more rare to see it in an empowering or flattering light. So today as trans and non-binary and queer storytellers are continuing to find their own voices and finding their audiences - are having the ability to find audiences in greater numbers, and as language and politics continue to evolve around how we express gender and sexuality, it can be instructive from time to time to take a look back and see how stories and experiences that don't hew to cisgender and heteronormative norms, whether they're sort of coded or nuanced or obscured, how they manage to make their way into the mainstream of film and television. So I'm thrilled that with tonight's film and with  the help of our guest Jenni Olson and Rhys Ernst, we can sit down and start to unearth some of these traces of trans identity and desire, albeit through a somewhat fantastical device as you'll see later tonight. So as Jenni and Rhys will explore, we might not always be satisfied by what we see when we're watching films from the past. But exploring the past can certainly be of help in directing what we want to see and how we want to be seen in the future. So a little bit about our guests tonight. Jenni Olson is a filmmaker and historian of LGBTQ cinema. Her films have screened at festivals around the world including Outfest. And in addition to her own filmmaking practice she serves on the Outfest UCLA Legacy Project Advisory Council. Her remarkable collection of shorts and trailers, documentaries, and feature films are on deposit at UCLA Film & Television Archive, and they form a major cornerstone of the Legacy Collection where a number of the titles that Jenni's - Jenni has rediscovered and identified have gone on to be restored by UCLA Film & Television Archive in partnership with Outfest as well as being screened at cinemas and festivals around the world. In addition to her tireless, tireless advocacy for LGBTQ film preservation on behalf of the Legacy Project, she has recently helped to bring the work of pioneering gay filmmaker Arthur Bresson Jr. back into circulation with restorations of "Gay U.S.A.", "Buddies", and "Forbidden Letters", which will screen in Berlin later this month. Rhys Ernst is a trans filmmaker and artist who has served as a producer and director on Amazon's "Transparent". His documentary miniseries "We've Been Around" explores some of the forgotten and hidden histories of transgender pioneers, the movements they formed, and the often unacknowledged work that they contributed to trans-liberation and the broader LGBTQ+ struggle. His most recent film "Adam" premiered at Sundance and it screened with us at Outfest last July. It's a period piece I should note, set in the recent past which is 2006, which as a cusp-y millennial was exciting for me to see and it's not as easy to pull off as it sounds. But "Adam" tells a coming-of-age story about a cisgender teenage boy who explores friendships and dating after he's mistaken for a trans man at a party. So to help introduce tonight's film and to introduce both our filmmaker and the film, are sort of our guest curators. Please help me in welcoming to the stage, Rhys Ernst and Jenni Olson. [audience applause] [Rhys Ernst] Hi, thank you guys all for coming tonight. I'm Rhys Ernst and as you just heard, I directed a movie called "Adam" which I guess you heard a really good synopsis of it. That was a very well put synopsis. It's, it's playing with this kind of gender deception trope or mistaken identity story that we've seen in, in films like "Just One of the Guys" and "Ladybugs" and "Tootsie" and going back to "Twelfth Night". And so I thought of "Adam" is sort of queering that type of story and when Jenni showed me "Something Special" it really kind of scrambled my brain because it was, it was queering the, that type of story in its own way even though it wasn't  a hundred percent from a queer perspective but it was sort of accidentally doing all these very queer and trans things that really surprised me and I thought it was really unusual and really  charming, interesting film worth, worth dissecting and celebrating. So without further ado I'm going to pass it to Jenni who can say more about it. [Jenni Olson] Thank you. Brendan, I loved your intro. So I bought the 35-millimeter print of "Something Special" about 20 years ago and UCLA, or the Legacy Project's been taking good care of it all these years. I'm very excited to share it with you. I was talking to  someone out in the lobby that I saw this on TV. So it came out in 1986. It was released in theaters for a minute. And I, I like stumbled on it on TV in, I think, 1987 or so, and was just so riveted and taken with it. And as a film collector in, I guess it was in 1998, that I came across the print of it and was like, "Oh my god, I have to have that." And so I'm excited for you to see it. Just a little bit of context. So it stars Pamela Adlon, who's amazing. I think this was actually her first role.   Her name is Pamela Segall at the time. And we get Patty Duke as the mom and John Glover as the dad - out-gay actor, John Glover. There's a great cameo by Seth Green and a really great supporting cast. It was not well received by the critics in 1986. I was just reading the L.A. Times review actually,  which is this kind of schizophrenic like, "This is not a very good film," and then it kind of is like,  "Well, actually it's kind of good," and this is like, "but it's not really very good," but it just like goes up and down. And then actually it ends by comparing Pamela Adlon to Dustin Hoffman in Tootsie and then ends up saying that it's surprisingly good, which is actually a really good description. [laughs] And, and I think, I just - like to like set your expectations that, like, it is an imperfect film. And like, you can go in with that and know that like it's not gonna hundred percent head in the direction that we want it to. And so just like knowing that, like, enjoy it for what it is and it's really a very fun film. And yeah. And then, well actually can I just ask before we start? I'm curious. How many of you have seen Rhys's film "Adam"? Well, and so hardly anyone. Okay. You have to see it when it comes out on digital in the Fall. Anyway, so we won't necessarily talk about it that much in relation to "Adam", but, but we'll just have a fascinating conversation no doubt afterwards and, and open it up to Q&A. It's always fun to do a Q&A in L.A. 'cause you people are so smart about the movies. And, anyway, so enjoy the film and we'll talk to you afterwards. Thank you. [Olson] That was so amazing. I, I've seen this like a  dozen times over the years and it's like it just gets better and better. [Ernst] It does get better. This is my third time watching it and it's really - it's funnier and funnier every time. But literally, you know, you're  watching it, you're like, "How does this exist?" Like, how was this made in 1986, and what were they thinking, and why? [chuckles] Do you know? [Olson] I - well, and like the layers of meaning and the layers of like how it seems so prescient in this way and like or so - that the meaning... I mean, even like, I don't know,  I watched it the last time like actually like a year ago, I showed it at the Quad. And even in the last year I feel like it's meaning has gotten more profound and poignant for me. I - my - I have two kids and one of my kids came out to me like a couple months ago as non-binary and, and like, and obviously the time the world that we're living in things are changing and like the just - the sense of the meaning of everything seems like radically different, I mean, certainly then it did when I was, when I saw this on TV in the late '80s and was relating to it as, you know, some - in my gender difference and queerness and butchness and, and I was particularly struck this time by the, the, the first scene, when the dad is dropping him off at school and, and gives him the watch and has this like, you know, like he's so like, "son," you know, all that stuff and how like it's so poignant to think of like a parent of - particularly like a parent of a trans kid being like, you know, "Go get him, son." Like a hundred percent supportive. And then all the, like, pronoun corrections which are so like, "What?!" Like, like that was a completely different thing in 1986. And like, and but it's like, so it's weird how resonant it is. [Ernst] Yeah. There's a lot of parts that feel really contemporary like the line of, "Why can't I be both?" You know, at the doctor's. [Olson] Yeah. [Ernst] Which is like, "What?!" Did that line just happen in an '80s after-school special? That's incredible. [scoffs] I really like the line when - actually it's before he, you know, transitions or whatever. He's at the dance and I guess Billy is like, "Boys have it made. I'm gonna go ask them to dance." And it's sort of  like this like, "I want to be a boy but I also want to date a boy." [Olson] Yeah. [Ernst] moment. When I first saw this  movie I was also reading Lou Sullivan's journals. Do you guys know Lou Sullivan? Of Lou Sullivan? He's - was this gay trans man, sort of pioneer who in the '80s fought to transition when the medical establishment basically prohibited - tried to prohibit him from transitioning because he wanted to date men, because he identified as gay. And at the time you had to become heterosexual if you're gonna transition. Kind of like what happens to Willy a little bit. And Lou ended up finally, you know, pushing through and everything but he was - I was at this point in his memoir of reading about how he was dating guys who, who were - the guys he was dating, the cis guys were kind of struggling with, "but, but I'm not gay but I, but I have a queer thing with you," and then they would sort of freak out about it and it would kind of push Lou backwards to kind of almost de-transition and kind of go back to living as a woman temporarily. Which is really weird to then be watching this and be like, "Oh my god," Willy just de-transitions out of like, you know, being out of step with his milieu, not being able to accept  like trans homoeroticism or something like that. So I kind of like to imagine that that was just a  temporary setback for Willy and then, you know, in the sequel he actually - him and Alfie got to get  together and Alfie was able to accept himself. [laughs] [laughter] [Olson] As a gay man. [Ernst] Yes, as a gay man. [Olson] Yeah. yeah, totally. [Ernst] They move to San Francisco. [Olson] Yeah, yeah totally, and live happily ever after. And like, I know, it is just mind-blowing in that respect. Yeah, um, I was like taking notes as we were watching. Oh, I wanted to say one of the - I was doing research  on the various, like, reviews of the film at the time. One of the critics described Pamela Adlon as looking like a pint-sized Ralph Macchio. [laughter] She was amazing! [Ernst] She's amazing in this. It's incredible. [Olson] So great to watch. [Ernst] Well I was saying before, you know, I'd seen just like movies like "Just One of the Guys" and other like '80s, kind of mistaken identity, gender switch movies, but movies like that always felt much more kind of like male gaze-y and like, I don't know if you guys have seen "Just One of the Guys", but it's sort of it's all kind of prurient and it's sort of like the actress is really kind of conventionally attractive as before and after and it's sort of - you can kind of feel that, like, there is like, you know, they're kind of playing that for like a male gaze sort of audience and for the kind of  yuks of it all, but she's still kind of hot, so it's confusing - it's weird. And this to me felt so different,  like there was none of that. And Willy was just kind of able to be his kind of kooky, little self and there wasn't really as much of a prurient kind of salaciousness around that. [Olson] Well and it really revels in the experience of watching Pamela Adlon be so convincing, in a way, you know, where you're  like, "Wow, she is really convincing." [Ernst] Yeah, I actually kind of struggle with the fact that she's like  not a butch or a trans masculine person in real life 'cause I'm like she's so convincing in this role and then to see that she's just a regular, you know, she's a regular cis lady, which is fine and everything, but it's my concep- it breaks my conception of this character a little, because I believe it so much. [Olson] Yeah. [Ernst] It's so weird to see Willy at the end, back, you know, sort of de-transitioned or back as Milly and you're like, "What?! That's so wrong." [Olson] Yeah. [Olson] Well it's interesting - I mean it's interesting in  relation to Hilary Swank in "Boys Don't Cry" where, you know, again like she's so convincing and so,  you know, I mean, I - that is such an amazing film and especially for her performance and, but also it makes me think of - now here's an obscure movie that needs to be re-released: "Second Serve", which was a TV movie with Vanessa Redgrave as Renee Richards, the trans woman tennis player and Vanessa Redgrave is so convincing as Renee pre-transition, as a, you know, playing a guy that then when she transitions to be Renee Richards, you're it - Renee Richards seems like she's less successfully transitioned. And, and, but the, but the main point of that being that Renee Richard or Vanessa Redgrave is so convincing as, I can't remember what her name was what Renee's name was before she, before she transitioned but, um, but, but like so much of the pleasure of the performance is in how successful she is as an, as an actress. And, you know, I mean obviously in the last couple years around the, the idea of trans folks playing trans characters - it's a very different world than it was in 1986, but you know, or in 1999 when Hilary Swank, you know, did "Boys Don't Cry". But, um, sorry I don't know where  I was going with that. [Ernst] Well, I mean this movie, it's interesting I was thinking 'cause it's like... The word - I mean to my knowledge - the word "trans" wasn't really thrown around or used in the mid-'80s, I mean maybe somewhere in the DSM or something but it wasn't really in parlance. Right? I mean... [Olson] Well, I mean, I think you had more transsexual, right? [Ernst] Yes. Right, transsexuals. But this movie couldn't have really been thought of in that way or mistaken for being a transgender narrative because it just wasn't in the [Olson] Right, that wasn't a thing. [Ernst] You know, which so it's... this type of movie just couldn't exist in the same contextless.. [chuckles] [Olson] Right, I mean, it was just like, "Oh here's, this," like "Hey here's a wacky premise." And like, [Ernst] Yeah. [Olson] I mean, you know, for me as a whatever I am, um, person, you know, I was like, "this movie speaks to me,"  and I related to it as something that, you know, and, and I, I don't know. I always used to say like, when I was  little like, "I want to be a boy. But then I would be a boy." [Ernst laughs] [Olson] You know and it was, in which this is like, kind of like that. Like, I love the scene where she's like, "Boys are animals!" You know. [Ernst] Yeah. And I, "and I won't become one!" Or something. [Olson] Yeah, "I won't become one", actually like. [Ernst] Yeah, it's great. [Olson] And it was like, yes, that's exactly how I felt, was like, "I want to be a boy, but then I would be a boy." And like, you know, like what do I do - what do I do with that? And like, the all the complexities of it and that, that like the "Can't I be both?" thing. And the, [Ernst] And the tension around like toxic masculinity and, and, and rejecting it, and then leaning into it and then running around like punching the walls and and and then sort of being misogynist but it's sort of like but, but struggling with that. Like there's all these kind of layers of like tension around that which I think are really interesting. [Olson] I love the stuff that we were talking earlier about your film and how this film, I think it would be an amazing double feature with your film. I'm sorry you guys haven't seen his film yet but there's this quality about, you know, that this person can teach cis men how to be better men. [Ernst] Yeah, which is a thing that happens in my movie too. There's a character, a trans guy who - so Adam accidentally is mistaken as trans at a queer party and he's like the one straight person in this world and he's 17 and kind of clueless and doesn't really realize it's, that that's what's happened until it's too late and then he gets caught in the lie and then he decides to keep the lie going. So it's kind of like this but the world is upside down and, you know, the whole, the dominant paradigm is queer and trans and he's the outsider. But he has a really close friend who's this trans guy who basically teaches him how to be a better person and teaches this like 17-year old boy how to become a man. And that's what - like one of the, you know, sort of aspects of the story I found so compelling when I first read it and it's interesting to see that, you know, reflected in here and how I was saying earlier how I, like, want Willy to have that character for him in the beginning to like teach him 'cause he's kind of like, he's being like Adam. He's like act - he's like being like a pinball bouncing around doing a bad job at masculinity. And he, if he had had like a trans masculine mentor it would have been so perfect but that he becomes that to the other cis guys and it kind of - he kind of plays both roles  in a way which I think is really interesting. But yeah, there's a lot of weird parallels in my movie and this movie, I think. [Olson] Yeah. I love also that it is, you know, it's this kind of critique of masculine like of - like here's the dad with his like, you know, crazy exaggerated - I guess you would say toxic masculinity or just like, uh... [Ernst] Yeah. [Olson] And, um, yeah. Okay, wait. I feel like I made one other note, scribbled probably illegible... [Ernst] I just also like love how all the women are so into Willy and he's just like, "I'm sorry, ladies. I'm gay." [laughs] [Olson] Yeah. [laughs] Yeah. [Ernst] And, and that he actually his, like, trans masculinity  poses as sort of like masculine ideal. That like the women are like, "Oh my god, this is the best thing ever." Like, "Where have you been?" [laughs] [Olson] Right, right. [Olson] It, it also has a lot in common with the  George Cukor film from 1936, "Sylvia Scarlett" which with Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant which like  plays a lot of similar territory of like she's passing and Cary Grant is, you know, is like, "Why am I attracted to this person," this, you know, "who seems to be male" and and, and similarly has like a woman character who's like hot for Sylvia Scarlett. I can't remember, oh Sylvester is, is Katharine Hepburn's male name. You know and Sylvester is kind of like, "ahh," and like the girl's trying to kiss her and, and, you know, plays with that. But... [Ernst] I was also gonna say that when I watched this last I was watching it on the YouTube link which has the different music at the opening which is - I actually really  like the music in the, in the other opening, a lot, which I recommend but in the YouTube file it was playing ads every so often and the ad that kept on coming up was like a Dove Shampoo for Men commercial and it had a man and woman on a couch like debating about, talking about how like men's hair is different than women's and that's why you need men's shampoo and it was going into this  whole like deep gender essentialist like shampoo ad that was interrupting "Milly/Willy", so it was really [laughs] like blowing my mind. Like how much hasn't changed? Yeah. [Olson] Yeah. [Ernst] It was funny 'cause like "Milly/Willy" was actually critiquing all this sort of hard harsh - the strictures of gender and then those gender, gender strictures are being reified every 10 minutes. [Olson] Yeah. [Olson] Well, should we open it up to...? I'm curious to  hear some questions and comments from you guys. We have a mic here so if you want to wait and... here you go. [Audience member #1] Rhys, I liked your point about how in the '80s... the awareness for the trans  community was a little bit less and that this was sort of made in absence of awareness which it definitely feels like when you're watching it. It's like a guy who's like, "I'm making a movie about how when you're a teenage girl you just wish you were dude 'cause it's way better." And then as she gets into that, the toxic masculinity, it's almost like it's... like to us watching it's like, "Yeah, that's toxic masculinity." But to the director to the film it's like, "This is what it takes to be a dude. If you're not up to it, can't be a dude." And in the end, you know, there is that sort of negative result where she goes back. But the movie has like that, like a weird - it is very masculine. It is very invested in what it means to be a man and what it means to be a woman, in a way that it sort of trips over itself and disproves itself with the characters' motivations and their interactions and, and that type of thing. So I guess there's a - to me there's a lot of conflict in the film itself, almost between what is wanting to be said by somebody who is outside of this bubble, and what it's accidentally saying by somebody trying to comment on something they don't really know about. Maybe you guys have something more to say about that than I do. [Olson] I do think that it's critiquing - that  it's like setting up, you know, you know, that the dad in particular is a kind of straw man figure that we're, we're meant to find, you know, first in some ways laughable and then, you know, see as a negative - someone who's so fixated on this rigid kind of gender. It's, it's written by, I guess, it's co-written by a guy and a, and a woman. And I, I have a sense of it as, I don't know, I would say a  feminist film, like in that, in its critique. And, and that the film itself, you know, is aware of itself as critiquing gender, in a, you know, in a - I mean it's also funny that it feels like a, like a TV movie, but it was a theatrically released movie. One of the reviews of it actually talks about how it was an independently produced film. It wasn't like a studio film. You know, and you know, it's obviously not like the kind of independent film that you made, like it's, you know, it still feels like it's coming out of the industry in a way. But, but I mean it is like a really interesting... it's an odd duck. [Member #1] It is. [Olson] In terms of, yeah, where it's coming from. [Ernst] I started to think when I watched it tonight that, you know, and I think you're getting at - it's like playing, it's kind of play - it plays with the tropes of gender, and it sort of leans into them and it sort of critiques them and it kind of endorses them and it kind of, its kind of moving around, it's sort of swimming around in it a lot. And, and it kind of plays different sides of that argument, I think, kind of for, for humor and different reasons, but then ultimately when it, you know, it's like Willy gains access to the kind of elite level of like gender performance with the like popular bully kids or whatever. And it's like hell. It's like he doesn't want to be there. It's like, that's where this - if all - "if this is where this sort of gender road leads, "like I don't want to be part of that." It sort of to me what I, how I take, you know, his sort of ejection, the hitting the eject button to some extent. That there's nowhere left to go. Like he kind of got to the top of the pyramid of the like gender hierarchy and it sucks, ha, up there. [Olson] Well and then that he, you know, I mean the other layer that's so interesting is that he comes face to face with homophobia. [Ernst] Yeah, absolutely. [Olson] And that, that and, you know, which is adjacent to the rigidity of gender norms and is like, "Okay. now what? Now I have to go back to being... a girl." [Ernst] Yeah. [Ernst] Yeah, it's, it's really interesting that like the world is like capacious enough, including the parents, for... [Olson, laughing] Right!  [Ernst] ...for transness but not for gayness. Like it's, like THAT's the deal-breaker. Which is, I guess, just says a lot about the '80s? I don't know. It's... [Olson] Well but it says a lot about like, that it is this like magical film. I mean that whole thing of like, you're just like, "What?" They're just like, "Okay, now he's a boy!" and like, and then like, they're so, like, you know, it's like in it - in the context of the film, it's a comedy. And so, like, the like, you know, all the gender, the pronoun corrections and stuff and like, you know, it's all laughs but it's serious underneath in this way that... yeah. [Ernst] And that trickster Seth Green. [laughter] [Olson] Yeah, yeah. [Olson] Yeah, it's a really, like I don't know like not to get too excited about it, but I'm like, "it's a radical film!" You know, in this way. [Ernst] It's really strange. I think it kind of is too. I think it's so strange that it begins and ends with little Seth Green sort of smiling straight into the camera breaking the fourth wall. [laughing] It's like, what is, what is up with that? That's crazy. I love it. [Olson] Back there. [Audience member #2] Yeah, I, I recall you saying that it may have been like accidental in terms of like it's queer sensibilities. And I'm just curious if you know the backstory about the project? Because there was a lot of like the, like Patty Duke and the like man-eater girl are like John Waters' characters kind of, like they're just like, these kind of out there and maybe they're, you can chalk that up to like being '80s kind of tropes in a way or at least the teenage girl. But like Patty Duke was just like bouncing off the walls like and so I was just like interesting to hear if there, if you knew anything about it in that way or they just, they just thought of it as like a Freaky Friday and they were like, "Okay we'll just do it like a version of Freaky Friday." [Olson] I know, you know, I, I really would like to take the time to do more research on it, and I haven't, in terms of like the folks who made it. And I, I do remember when I first bought the film print 20 years ago and showed it at, I think I must have shown it in San Francisco at the Roxy. And I did talk to the producer, M. David Chilewich at the time and I don't remember what [laughs] - I like I got his permission to show it. And it's in my notes somewhere what he said but I would be really particularly curious to track down the writers and see what, you know, what they were thinking. [Ernst] It does kind of seem like there's a tiny queer bone in that body somewhere. You know what I mean? I feel like there is something, there's somebody somewhere on the chain that was influencing, you know? It's just there's a little bit, it's just too much to be total coincidence. Am I - I could be totally wrong. [Olson] Yeah. [Ernst] But now that you mention it about the sort of, you know, John Waters-y aspect of it all, I'm like, "Yeah!" [Member #2] [...] it's like so over the top. [Ernst] Yeah. [Olson] I, I also love the earnestness of it. Like it has like a - yeah an earnestness that that actually reminds me a lot of "Times Square". Do you know the 1980 film "Times Square"? [Member #2] Oh yeah, of course, I love that movie. [Olson] Also one of my favorite movies of all time. And, you know, which is so earnest. And like you really have to, you know, like so earnest that it could - you're just like, "What? Really? This is like totally cheesy," and like, you know, but you just are like, "Okay, I'm gonna go with it and like pretend that I'm..." I mean, especially like as it - 'cause it's also,  it's a teen movie, you know? And it's like, okay, like here we have this like kind of over the top, you know, like the fight at the junkyard that's like - oh the thing with the, you know, the tires over their shoulders is like totally fake-y, right? You know, it's like we have to - we're suspending our disbelief and it's like, "Oh, hahaha," this is like a teenage, you know, joke-y - not even a teen whatever - it's a kids movie, you know? And like, but we're just like, "Let's just go there and like be earnest and be open-hearted." I love that about it. I think there's... [Audience member #3] I'm wondering if you guys would classify this as a feminist film? Because I feel like it veers on the edge of it in a way. Like, it is centered around a female perspective. It does critique masculinity and gender norms. But in the end she does revert back to being a girl and she does that for a boy, which I feel like is what often goes wrong with, with films that are centered around the female perspective, is that it's all about like a boy or a man or whatever. But then there's also the side that you mentioned about how she realized how, how, you know, toxic masculinity can be, and how being a boy is like, you know, she didn't feel comfortable in that anymore so maybe it was her choice? Like what, what do you guys think? [Ernst] I mean, yeah, thinking about it more like, and I'm like, maybe, maybe I'm being, you know, maybe I'm kind of jumping to conclusions that she even is a totally like cis woman at the end. I mean she's got a cool weird haircut. Maybe she's kind of non-binary person at the end. I mean we're making presumptions perhaps. I just - I don't know. I was thinking about how again like as you're talking about how like, when [laughs] when Willy hits the apex of masculinity it's all about saying, "Shit!" and, "Piss!" and like, "Sit on it!" and like that's like, that's the peak of masculinity. So the more I think about it the more I think it really is skewering all these things and, and is a feminist movie. I mean imperfect, imperfectly so and very much of its era and with the pitfalls of mid-'80s, you know, gender politics I guess, but... [Olson] I think, I mean I have the - just have the sense of like the bulk of the film, you know, is playing with all this and, and, and, and then, you know, that it is just simply a function of like, how do we end a movie? And that it's like, "Oh, I know how we end a movie. This is how you end a movie." Like, this is how you end - this is how every movie ends, is like, the boy and the girl will go off together and, and, and, I mean, it's, it's - was great seeing it again and like remembering like, that really only happens at the very end. Like we get like, you know, whatever however long it is, we get you know 85 minutes and then like five minutes of, you know... Like, that's pretty awesome. What, whereas like "Sylvia Scarlett" is like you only get like half of it and then like the other half of it is like, "Okay, now she's, they're all cis and straight and everything's normal." And I don't know so... yeah I, I think it's pretty  impressive. Anyway. I think... [Audience member #4] Can I just jump on that same question? 'Cause I feel like it was very feminist from the sort of a fourth wave kind of perspective of, let's almost like reward the more gentle male, the Alfie character, with, I mean, it's a little bit over the top that he's, you know, disabled in that what, you know, he's like so the opposite of the bully, like sort of the classic 97-pound weakling character.  But, but it stands for, you know, let's - I don't know. It's, it's a weird, it's a very weird pastiche of different mixed-up things but it feels like more a critique of that toxic masculinity and how even though it goes back to a heteronormative ending, it's, it's sort of like, you know, a morality tale about, you know, a more balanced gender balanced kind of society that, I mean, I'd sort of read it that way from this sort of perspective looking back and how they were trying to maybe mess with  that a little bit. Does that makes sense? Like... [Olson] Yeah, I mean, I think that the weight, the overall weight  of the film is towards it, you know, a critique of gender. And with regard to Eric Gurry's character, I, I think it is also on the one hand, fantastic to see, you know, the character with a disability as, you know, in so integrated into the film and that that's a part of the film. I think it's also a little, seems a little problematic that then, you know, in the end it's like, "Oh no, actually here he's..." you know, he too is "normalized" in this way that just seems slightly problematic. Like, in a, in a way that parallels the like, you know, every - okay, it's all - everything's all just sorted out now, back to, you know, "normal" in a way that... [Ernst] Like him being heterosexual, able-bodied, cisgender, heh... [Olson] Yeah, in a way that like, yeah it just has a problematic quality to it of... anyway. [Ernst] Yeah. [Audience member] [inaudible] [Ernst] Well and in interesting ways when it's work - when it's working and they're there, there's an alliance sort of between the trans and queer. It's sort of, it's sort of like Crip Theory of like, you know, the, the overlap or interplay between disability studies and queer studies and when, you know, how those bodies are, you know, pushed either  considered, you know, normal or abject. And so I think there's, it's actually kind of doing something  interesting with connecting those, those two types of people in the middle and then, you know, at the end it kind of wraps it up into like a sort of a aspiration little bow which doesn't, isn't, you know, very helpful, I guess. But, for a little while it's, there's an interesting, you know, connection between those things. [Audience member #5] I thought it was really interesting how it seemed very self-aware, some of the commentary that was in the movie, in particular the bit in the car, it was all about pay equity. I mean literally the dad's giving, giving him a raise, just because  he had a change in gender. [Olson] Yeah. Yeah. [laughter] [Member #5] And I also thought it was very interesting that - I thought the most accepting character of the transition was the child. The Seth Green character. [Olson] Yeah. Actually, I also love the, the best friend, the girl, [Ernst] Steph. [Olson] who is such an ally. I mean... [Ernst] Yeah... and trans amorous. [laughter] I was wondering what her wish was actually. 'Cause she was like - was she, she wishing for this to happen because this is her secret wish actually? That was my new theory. [Olson] But, but, I mean, did, did you find it - like I found it like quite poignant that - I don't know, I was just in this headspace about like, you know, all kinds of queerness and like that, that how powerful it is to see depictions of, of people being... [Ernst] So unquestioning on her part. [Olson] Yeah, loving, supportive. [Ernst] She just kind of adores him. [Olson] Yeah. [Ernst] It's really sweet. [Olson] And like a real friend. And... [Ernst] Yeah. She's a great act-  her performance is great too. Do you know anything about her, that actress? [Olson] I don't. Yeah. [Olson] Umm, do you want to? [Audience member #6] We kind of already  touched - talked about it but two things I want to say. All the characters were so good. Like, the dad, Stephanie's, that blew me away. I loved all those characters. The second thing is, I don't think the ending's that big of a letdown because she's wearing pants to a dance. So like there is part of that gender... [Olson] Yeah, right. [Member #6] They did that on purpose, I feel. [Ernst] Like that one dangly earring or something. [Member #6] Yeah, just wanted to bring that up. [Olson] She - they could be non-binary. [Ernst] They could be. [Olson] It's true they could be decades ahead on... [Ernst] I think they might be. [Olson] the non-binary thing. No, I'm glad that you brought that up 'cause it  is that that end that they specifically shoot it like that. That's like here's this like pan up and you're like, "okay there's someone here wearing pants." And then it's like, "okay," this, they become  more feminine pants as it pans up. [Ernst] Maybe it really is Milly/Willy being both or neither, 'cause that's like what that character's stated desire was [Olson] To, at the beginning. [Ernst] at first, yeah, at the end of the first act or whatever, beginning of the second act. So maybe that is what - I mean, this is getting really, really jumping out here, but I'm, I'm kind of on board with that reading. [Olson] Yeah, I'll go with that. [laughs] Let's have it all. [laughter] Yeah. Um, in the middle there was someone... yeah. [Audience member #7] Yeah, just kind of jumping on board with that a bit. I, I definitely feel like this film regardless of the author, their intentions, came from a kind of queer space because you see Willy/Milly as this kind of locus of queer desire for everyone around... them. Both I'd say as a male but then also then later as a female that has this kind of ambiguous  presentation and it's, it's interesting to see the sort of homo social spaces where, you know, with,  with her friend Steph, you know, they, they go to bed together as two females where there's already a sort of latent kind of energy to that and an energy to the scene where, you know, her friend is kind of primping her and trying to prepare her for, you know, go out and get 'em kind of thing.  There's, there's something of a latent sexual energy in that, between two females, cisgendered, straight, whatever. And then even and then later as Willy in a male space, the kind of latent sexuality there. So I feel like, you know, and then for the parents too it's kind of like, you could read the movie as the society in the '80s sort of obsessively recreating the black and white, male/female, you know, reproduction of the social order. And this person in their ambiguity is expressing a latent desire that really everyone around them has - straight or gay or trans or cis. That's what I felt like connects so much about it now because that's, that's true of society at any stage. Like we all have that. Anyway, yeah. I thought it was really from a genuine space, somewhere. [Olson] Yeah, yeah. [Ernst] Yeah, I love that. I was just thinking too that, it's almost to hear you talk about that, it's almost like Pamela played sort of like a Peppermint Patty dyke at the beginning, and then a gay trans guy, and then a non-binary femme? Which is like kind of wild. So... It's incredible. [Olson] It really hit all the bases. What? [Ernst] It's incredible. I mean here's to Pamela. [Olson] Indeed! Yes, let's hear it for Pamela. [clapping] Where's the mic? There's a, there's a hand. [Audience member #8] So usually in the body swap kind of trope that goes on, it seems like the magic kind of imposes whatever the body is. But with this one what I found kind of fascinating was that it wasn't imposed so much as she was given the option. Because when she went to the doctor they said you have the opportunity to be both sexes. You have both organs going on. It's really just her choice to make in the end. And the ending, I don't - I see it kind of twofold as a little bit of a letdown and a little bit kind of hopeful as people are kind of reading it because she does get to choose the way that she expresses and performs whatever her gender preference is. She expresses it through her clothing, through her haircut, through the way that she presents herself. But it is kind of like - it creates a situation like a "Pretty in Pink" where they just kind of create heteronormative coupling just because they just want to wrap things up in the end. And what I also found fascinating was it kind of created, um, like a reverse Jane Eyre situation, because in Jane Eyre the only way that she could be with the central male character is when he kind of denigrates himself down by being burned and disfigured. Whereas in this one, with the disabled character, he actually has to stand up and be on crutches in order for them to kind of get together and get that happily ever after. But the other kind of small lighter point that I wanted to make was - and I kept on scratching my brain trying to figure this out. When the girl said that her lips, her lipstick was "Twinkie", I was trying to figure out what exactly she meant by "Twinkie". [Olson] I also was mystified by what that was supposed to mean. What the - in the, in the junkyard when she's like  trying to get the date to kiss her. Yeah. [Ernst] Was that the tootsie roll? No. [Olson] It's in that scene. [Ernst] It's in that scene. [Olson] Yeah, yeah.  No idea. No idea. [Ernst] What kind of heterosexual mumbo-jumbo? [laughter] [Olson] I, I think - I don't know - I'm like, I'm such a fan of it and and I, I mean it's interesting to think back to the kind of the earlier part of it that you know, ostensibly the, the motivation, you know, of like of Milly, you know, is not, is not gender  dysphoria, you know. It, and it doesn't seem to be actually queerness per se, You know, in fact on the  contrary, you know, and like all of the stuff that all the sexuality stuff as we've just talked about. Like, you know, she is pretty normative. And like, there - I mean, I, I remember watching it back  in the day and that being sort of like, "Okay, that is unsatisfying for me." You know, is like, this is not someone who's struggling with their gender identity. It's just that that classic thing of like,  "Oh well, oh sexism," you know. And like, you know, I mean, she says like, you know, that the like crucial scene in that early part is like, "You would take me ser- if I were a boy, you would take me seriously." And like, that that is the motivating factor. In other words, like, "I am a straight cis girl, "and like the only reason that I'm doing this is to be taken seriously." And, and that, you know, that is like, "Well that's kind of boring to me." Like that's not queer at all. You know, in fact, that's just totally  straight or whatever conventional or... And, and so then like, you know, in that context, it's, it's, it's like even more bizarre how weirdly identifiable the whole film is. Like, I don't know. It's, it's, but it's just, it's just so fascinating how a film made in 1986 can, can have all these things that we connect with  today in, in such a way that just seems so prescient, which like obviously had  no - there's no way of knowing. Unless Seth Green had something to do with it. And really actually anticipated that we would come to this time in - of where we had such a thing as transgender identity and - I don't - pronouns. And, or I don't know that, it's kind of incredible.  Anyway. Do we want - do we have time for one more question, I would say. Anyone or out there. Or we could wrap it up. Okay, one more. [Audience member #9] I do want to throw one thing out on the grounds of Milly at the end being maybe non-binary, because of all the pants and the one earring and the cool short haircut. We did never get a scene clarifying that her male thingy was gone. So. [laughter] Just going to throw that out there. [Ernst] Brilliant. [snap] [snap] [snap] [snap] [laughter] [Olson] On that note, wow. [Ernst] Wow. [Lucas] I just wanted to say my corny reading is that because of the, the four kind of classical elements in the beginning and with the end of the film, Willy/Milly represents kind of the divine androgyne in a single person. So that's my spacey alchemical read on it, but... [Ernst] Ooh, I like that too. [Olson] That sounds good to me. [Lucas] Could you tell us, Rhys, is there, where can we catch "Adam"? [Ernst] Oh, so it's, it's com- it's already played in theaters here and moved on but it's gonna come out on streaming and I don't know exactly when, like probably November, early December. But it'll be like, you know, widely publicized I think, so just keep an eye out. And you can also follow like "Adamthefilm" on various social media. [Lucas] And Jenni, anything you want us to - want to tell us about that you've been working on? [Olson] Well, just that now I will be working on seeing if I can get someone to do a digital release of "Something Special" somehow. And, [Ernst] Hear, hear. [Olson] and then, you know, let's look forward to a double feature of "Adam" and "Something Special". Yeah. [Lucas] Well, Rhys, Jenni, thank you both so much and thank you for bringing this incredible film. It's been a treat. [Olson] Thank you. [applause] [Ernst] Thank you. Thanks for coming.