Wachowski Brothers, Creators of ‘Sense8’ and ‘Matrix’, Are Now Wachowski Sisters

After meeting Lilly Elbe in “The Danish Girl”, it’s time to welcome Lilly Wachowski🇧🇷 Before being born again as Lilly, the director was known as Andy Wachowsky, a director, writer and producer with her sister Lana Wachowski – who before being Lana, was known as Larry.

Confused? We explain: brothers Laurence and Andy were born men and reborn women now in adult life.

CURIOSITY: Everyone thought they were twins, but they are actually 2 years apart.

The first step in the transition was Lana (formerly Laurence), while they were still producing the matrix trilogy🇧🇷

Now, some 15 years later – as no one is quite sure when Lana and Lilly transitioned – it’s time to say goodbye to Andy and have two writers, directors and producers on Sense8.

Threatened with having her transition publicized by the press, Lilly released a statement about her decision to keep everything a secret until then:

“SHOCKING SEX CHANGE – WACHOWSKI BROTHERS ARE SISTERS NOW!

Here’s the headline I’ve been waiting to read this past year. So far scared and/or eyes rolling in irritation. The “news” was almost published countless times. Each was preceded by a threatening e-mail from my agent – ​​reporters coming in asking for information about the “Gender Transition” story. Andy Wachowski ” which they were about to publish. In response to this public threat of unwilling disclosure, I prepared a statement made up of one part piss, one part vinegar, and 12 parts gasoline.

That statement had a bunch of politically relevant ideas about the dangers of coming out as a trans person, and the horrific suicide statistics and transgender homicide rates. Not to mention the slightly sarcastic ending that “revealed” that my father had injected praying mantis blood into his balls before conceiving each of his children to produce a brood of superwomen bent on female domination. Okay, mega sarcastic.

But that didn’t happen. The editors of these publications did not print a story that was just salacious in substance and could have a potentially fatal effect. And being the optimist that I am, I was happy to scratch it and move on.

Then last night, as I was getting ready to go out to dinner, the doorbell rang. Standing on my porch was a man I didn’t know.

“This might be a little awkward,” he said in an English accent.

I remember sighing.

It is sometimes very hard work to be optimistic.

He proceeded to explain that he was a journalist for the Daily Mail, which was the biggest news service in the UK and definitely not a tabloid. And that I actually had to sit down with him tomorrow or the next day or the next week so I could have my picture taken and tell my story, which would be so inspiring! And that I really didn’t want to have someone from the National Enquirer following me around. By the way – The Daily Mail is definitely not a tabloid.

My sister Lana and I have largely avoided the press. I find talking about my art frustratingly tedious and, speaking for myself, a downright humiliating experience. I knew at some point I would have to come out publicly. You know, when you’re living as a transgender person it’s… kind of hard to hide. I just wanted some time to get my head straight, to get comfortable.

But apparently I’m not the one to decide that.

After he gave me his card and I closed the door, I started to remember where I had heard about the Daily Mail. It was the “news” company that had played a huge role in the national public outing of Lucy Meadows, a primary school teacher and transgender woman in the UK. An editorial in the “non-tabloid” demonized her as a detrimental influence on the delicate innocence of children and, she summed up by saying, “not only is he stuck in the wrong body, he’s in the wrong job.” And I knew of her existence not because she was transgender, but because three months after the Daily Mail article was published, Lucy committed suicide.

And now there they were, at the door of my house, almost as if to say:

“There’s another one here! Let’s drag it out so we can all look! 🇧🇷

Being transgender is not easy. We live in a binary world in terms of gender, imposed by the majority. This means that, when you are transgender, you have to face the harsh reality of living the rest of your life in a world that is openly hostile to you.

I’m one of the lucky ones. Having the support of my family and the means to pay doctors and therapists, and that gave me a chance to actually survive this process. Transgenders without support, means and privileges do not have that luxury. And many do not survive. In 2015, the transgender murder rate reached an all-time high in this country. A disproportionate number of victims were black trans women. These are just the homicides recorded like this, as not all trans people fit the binary gender statistics on homicide rates – and that means the real numbers are higher.

And although we’ve come a long way since ‘Silence of the Lambs’, we continue to be stigmatized and vilified in the media, where attack ads portray us as potential predators to stop us from even using the bathroom. The so-called ‘bathroom laws’ that are popping up across the country are not going to keep children safe, they force trans people to use bathrooms where they can be beaten and/or murdered. We are not predators, we are prey.

So yes, I am transgender.

And yes, I transitioned.

I came out to my friends and family. Most people at work know too. Everyone is cool with it. Yes, thanks to my fabulous sister they’ve been through this before, but it’s also okay because they’re amazing people. Without the love and support of my wife, friends and family, I would not be where I am today.

But these words, “transgender” and “transition” are difficult for me because both have lost their complexity of assimilation into the mainstream. There is a lack of nuance of time and space. Being transgender is widely understood to exist at the dogmatic terminal of male or female. And the “transition” conveys a sense of immediacy, a before and after from one terminal to another. But the reality, my reality is that I made the transition and it will continue throughout my life, through the infinity that exists between man and woman, as it exists at infinity between the binary zero and one. We need to elevate the dialogue beyond the simplicity of binary. Binary is a false idol.

Now, gender theory and queer theory hurt my tiny brain. The word combinations, like free-form jazz, the disjointed, discordant ringing in my ears. I yearn for an understanding of queer and gender theory, but it’s a struggle as is the struggle to understand my own identity. I have a quote in my office by José Muñoz that was given to me by a good friend. I stare at it in contemplation sometimes, trying to decipher its meaning, but the last sentence resonates:

‘Strangeness is essentially about a rejection of the here and now and an insistence on the potentiality of another world.’

So I will continue to be optimistic adding my shoulder to the Sisyphean struggle to progress and in my very being be an example of the potentiality of another world.

Lilly Wachowski

With that classy statement, we’re typing with our feet as we’re clapping with our hands.

Congratulations on the words and welcome Lilly!