Rebecca Root, a British actress, stand-up comedian, and voice and speech teacher, was born in Woking, Surrey, England. She spent her early childhood there before her family moved to rural Oxfordshire when she was eleven. She attended Bartholomew School in Eynsham and developed an interest in acting through local drama groups and the National Youth Theatre of Great Britain. After completing her sixth-form education in 1987, she moved to London to train at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts. Root subsequently spent approximately a decade working as an actress in television and theatre. Her early television appearances included the popular British sitcom Keeping Up Appearances and the medical drama Casualty. Her theatrical work included productions of The Lady's Not for Burning, Hamlet, and Tartuffe. Although she gained professional experience across a range of productions, she eventually found that opportunities in acting had become more difficult to obtain following her transition. In 2003, Root transitioned from male to female. She later pursued a new professional direction by studying voice at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, where she earned a Master of Arts in Voice Studies in 2012. Combining her academic training with her acting experience, she developed a career as a voice and speech coach, helping transgender people find voices that felt authentic to their gender identities.
Her work reflected an understanding that voice is an important aspect of personal expression and how people are perceived by others. Root also explored the subject through writing and research. In 2009, she published an article entitled There and Back Again: Adventures in Genderland in the journal Voice and Speech Review. Her professional interests brought together acting, vocal technique, gender, and the practical challenges faced by transgender people seeking a voice that better reflected who they were. In August 2014, the BBC commissioned Boy Meets Girl, a romantic sitcom centred on Judy, a transgender woman in her forties who begins a relationship with a younger man. Root was selected to play the leading role, marking a significant opportunity for a transgender actress to portray a transgender character in a major British television comedy. The commission attracted attention because transgender actors had long faced limited opportunities to play substantial, authentic roles on screen. For Root, the project offers the prospect of combining her acting talents with a story featuring a transgender woman at its centre. Her growing recognition is also reflected in the wider discussion about transgender representation in British entertainment. Root has been emerging as an actress whose experience, professional training, and commitment to vocal work gave her a distinctive place in the industry.
Monika: Rebecca, welcome, and thank you for joining me today!
Rebecca: Hi Monika, thanks for the warm welcome!
Monika: The premiere of “Boy Meets Girl” is drawing closer. Is the excitement building on your side?
Rebecca: Certainly! It’s hopefully going to make a bit of a splash. I hope the response will be as upbeat as the early signs have indicated. Having said that, we still have a way to go. Filming should commence in the new year, and I don’t know when it will actually hit the screens.
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| Filming the pilot. Rebecca with Harry Hepple, co-star of Boy Meets Girl. Picture © 2014 Rebecca Root |
Monika: Please tell me more about Judy. What draws you to this role?
Rebecca: Judy is in her 40s, she still lives at home with her Mum and has had a series of disappointing dates/relationships. Quite unexpectedly, she meets this guy Leo in a bar and they hit it off. He’s much younger than her… but is actually very mature in his reaction when she breaks the news that she is transgender. I like the part of Judy as she is warm, witty, and wise, or at least tries to be. Her heart’s in the right place, and you feel for her as the relationship with Leo develops.
Monika: In March 2014, the pilot was screened at the BBC Sitcom Showcase during the Salford Comedy Festival. How did the audience react?
Rebecca: Ah, it was fabulous. I hadn’t seen the pilot before the screening and was really nervous. But the moment it began and I heard the first laughs, I knew it was going to be OK. As the story unfolded, the audience really was drawn in. There were sighs, laughs, and even a few tears…!
Monika: Every actor borrows a little from a character, or the other way around. How close is Judy to real life?
Rebecca: I suppose the obvious similarity is that Judy and I are both trans. And in our 40s. And there are some other characteristics we share, I guess, like the sense of humor and being romantic. But unlike Judy, I don’t live with my family, although I do still flatshare in a rented apartment. And I rarely go on dates…
Monika: “Boy Meets Girl” is far from your debut, as you can boast a considerable number of theatre and TV roles.
Rebecca: I trained at Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts in London and graduated in 1990. So I’ve actually been working in the entertainment industry for quite a while, although none of my roles has ever been as high profile as Judy! If Boy Meets Girl really takes off, I’ll be one of those actors people call an “overnight success 25 years in the making”!
Monika: Transgender stories and characters have appeared in films, newspapers, and books for years. What is your take on them so far?
Rebecca: Over the years there has been a range of roles, from very positive to really cringe-worthy. Hilary Swank was awesome in Boys Don’t Cry, and Tom Wilkinson in Normal (an HBO movie) was terrific. But apart from guest appearances by people like Adele Anderson and indeed myself to an extent, we’ve had to wait till Orange Is the New Black to see a trans actor in a major role. I think Laverne Cox has done brilliantly to get the trans identity out there. Otherwise, it’s a shame that non-trans people get the big trans parts. It’s a rather contentious area, frankly, so I’m glad to be able at last to help redress the balance.
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| Rebecca in her dressing room at Wimbledon Studios, where the pilot of Boy Meets Girl was filmed. Picture © 2014 Rebecca Root |
Monika: Acting is only one part of the picture, since you also perform stand-up. How does the comedy side of your career look these days?
Rebecca: Actually, I haven’t been very active on the circuit for a year or two, as I found my day job as a voice teacher drained my time and focus somewhat. But I love performing stand-up when I get the chance. It’s such an immediate environment to work in. You totally know where you stand!
Monika: Do transgender jokes make it into your routine?
Rebecca: One or two, if the mood is right. But I haven’t chosen to focus too much on trans issues. I like being funny first, trans second, if you see what I mean?
Monika: Yes, of course. Some people speak of transgender art as a category of its own. Does it exist, and what does it mean to be a transgender artist?
Rebecca: I do have a painting by a transgender artist which I bought at an exhibition of work by a group brought together by Gendered Intelligence last year. But I didn’t buy it because of the trans connection necessarily, I bought it because I loved the picture. I imagine there are trans artists out there, in the same way as there are trans writers, singers, and actors, but I don’t really know who they are. I’m not really into the “scene”, I’m afraid.
Monika: You made the transition yourself. How old were you, and was it a difficult process?
Rebecca: I was 34. Probably the most difficult aspect of the process was simply making the decision to do it. I spent several years seeing all sorts of therapists and psychiatrists before coming to the conclusion that I had no option other than to transition. It was doing my head in, all that going round in circles. And I couldn’t live somewhere in between. I needed to be as fully female as I could.
Monika: Did you follow any transgender role models at the time of your transition?
Rebecca: There was a trans girl who won Big Brother in 2004, I think, called Nadia Almada. She was such a bubbly character who won the nation’s hearts and minds. Although I’d already begun my transition by then, it helped to have someone else out there who was in the public eye. My other role models have been April Ashley, Jan Morris, and Eddie Izzard, who, although he is not out and out trans, still demonstrates a wonderful sense of ease in his gender expression.
Monika: Coming out is often the toughest step. What was the hardest part of it for you?
Rebecca: Not being able to talk to my grandmother for fear of her rejecting me. She was in her 90s and held some rather old-fashioned opinions about modern society and so on, and so although we had always been close, I decided not to tell her about becoming Rebecca. I later regretted this, as I felt she never met the real me, and never saw me finally happy, as she died a couple of years after I came out to the rest of the world. I think you have to let people make their own minds up about you. Don’t impose your fears on them, as they might surprise you and actually be cool about it. I’ll never know that about my grandmother. I wish I could have trusted her to be OK.
Monika: Turning to the wider picture, where do transgender women stand in British society today?
Rebecca: Well, I think transgender people of all identities (male, female, somewhere in between) really are becoming more and more visible and accepted in society, aren’t they? So it’s a good time to be yourself, who you feel you truly are. Trans, genderqueer, non-binary, whatever.
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| Rebecca at MediaCity UK, Salford, where the pilot of Boy Meets Girl was screened. Picture © 2014 Rebecca Root |
Monika: The transgender cause is usually presented together with the rest of the LGBT community. As the last letter in the abbreviation, can the T promote its own cause within the group?
Rebecca: As I mentioned before, I’m not really very well up on “the scene”… but the more I engage with groups like Gendered Intelligence and All About Trans (who got the Trans Comedy Award off the ground in the first place, which led to the development of Boy Meets Girl), and the more I meet with other people from the “T” part of the LGBT community, the more I learn about the wonderful range of gender expressions and sexual identities in the world. Being the T in LGBT hasn’t negated my own experience, and I’ve actually found a good place to be, socially, under that umbrella.
Monika: Politics next: are you active in it, and do you take part in any lobbying campaigns? Can transgender women make a difference in that arena?
Rebecca: I’m not an especially political animal, although I do actively support my local MP (Lynne Featherstone). It has crossed my mind that I might be in a position to make a difference in people’s lives in the future, so I wouldn’t rule out going into politics at some point in my life.
Monika: You are the only transgender woman working as a voice and speech specialist in the UK today. What are the recent trends in transgender voice adaptation?
Rebecca: Well, as far as I know I am… there may be someone who prefers not to identify as trans also working in this field… But yes, certainly, my own gender identity does provide me with an insight into the needs of the trans population. Most of my private clients are transwomen, since the hormones taken by transmen tend to do the job for them. I tend to maintain a small client list, although the work is in demand.
Monika: How have attitudes toward voice changed over the years, among your clients and for you personally?
Rebecca: Having said that, I have noticed that people are increasingly not worrying about how they sound. They just don’t care what others think. Personally, I used to care a great deal about matching my voice to my gender presentation, but now I am less anxious about it. I still get “sirred” a bit on the phone, and it bothers me WAY less today than it did ten years ago. Perhaps that’s just a part of getting old!
Monika: What role does love play in your life?
Rebecca: If you mean romantic love, then it’s absolutely zero. I don’t date. I’m not on any dating websites. The only people who hit on me are people I don’t fancy. I never meet singles at parties (in fact, I don’t really go to many parties, oh dear, I sound quite dull, don’t I?!). But that’s not to say I wouldn’t like to. One day perhaps I will meet someone. Till then, I’m quite happy being single.
Monika: Many transgender women put their memoirs on paper. Has the idea of writing a book of your own ever crossed your mind?
Rebecca: Oh yes, I’d like to do that one day. Very much. I’ve always loved writing, and it’s one of the things that drew me to stand-up comedy. And I’m a sometime poet as well. I think I’ll wait to see what happens once Boy Meets Girl is out, though. That would be the hook to get the book sold, I think.
Monika: Is anything new in the pipeline at the moment?
Rebecca: I’m developing a one-woman theatre piece I made recently called Eleutheria (Greek for “freedom”), in which I chart my journey of gender expression. I performed it at an international arts and education conference in London this summer, and the response was fabulously positive. It was only a short piece, so the next step is to build it into something longer for the fringe and festival circuit next year.
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| Eleutheria at VASTA Conference Identity Cabaret (YouTube). |
Monika: Some young transgender girls are struggling with gender dysphoria right now. What would you recommend to them?
Rebecca: Well, of course, I’d say the same to transgender men as well as to transwomen. First of all, to quote Douglas Adams, don’t panic. You’re not alone. You’re not the first and you won’t be the last. Take comfort in the history of our population and how much it has changed for the better over the past 20 or so years.
Monika: Beyond not panicking, how can someone begin to find peace with who they are?
Rebecca: Be yourself. Try to find a calm acceptance of who you feel yourself to be. Once you have established that identity clearly in your mind (and if you are like me it might take some time; that’s OK, it’s not a race), then you’ll find that what other people think or say about you really doesn’t matter. Then you can do something about the physical side of things if you feel the need to. Some folk do move quickly on this, and others may find their circumstances hold them back a bit for whatever reason, but my main point is that once your inner turmoil is assuaged, the outward changes can follow quite naturally.
Monika: Is there something small that anyone can do every day to help?
Rebecca: Finally, I recommend smiling. Smile at your reflection at least once a day. That way you’ll guarantee at least one smile that day. It also makes you emotionally more open, and a smile is a great way to break down barriers.
Monika: Rebecca, thank you for this conversation. Fingers crossed for “Boy Meets Girl” and everything that comes next!
Rebecca: Thank you very much, Monika, it’s been a pleasure.
The main photo credit: © 2014 by Steve Lawton
All the photos: courtesy of Rebecca Root.
© 2014 - Monika Kowalska
