Emma Goswell: 0:05
Oh, hi friends. I'm Emma Goswell and I'm your host for Coming Out Stories. We're a podcast from what Goes On Media and, funnily enough, we share Coming Out Stories. It's all in an attempt to spread the love and share positive representations of queer people. Now, if you love our podcast, please subscribe also. Why not spread the word and tell others? We're also looking for sponsors. So if you know anyone who might want to support this rather brilliant grassroots LGBTQ plus podcast, then please tell them to go to comingoutstoriespodcastcom and click on the work with us tab. Why don't you look at our website? You'll find loads of other stuff too Coming out stories podcast dot com.
Emma Goswell: 0:47
Now, as I said right back at the beginning of this series, I really do want to support our trans and non-binary family as much as possible, so I'm thrilled that this episode I've been chatting to the most incredible trans woman, jenny, has quite the story. The first time she ever went out the house as Jenny wearing female clothes was also the same day she stood on a stage and did a comedy set. For the first time she was 40. Oh, and it was also the first time she'd ever been to a gay club. Talk about not doing things by halves. It's time to meet Jenny.
Jenny: 1:22
So I would say I've been out for like properly as Jenny for three, four years, but not not fully, until I came to Manchester. When I came to Manchester I came out out like I decided Jenny was going to be the person that arrives in Manchester. Nobody knows the person before me. So when I came out I of told people, but they still knew my past and I kind of thought that that held me back a little bit. So part of moving to Manchester, as well as wanting to do comedy, was to make a new life.
Emma Goswell: 1:54
Well, I like to think Manchester's a good place to come out. Plenty of people have chosen it to come out in. But let's sort of go before that, because I'm guessing you were a bit older when you moved to Manchester oh gosh, yeah.
Jenny: 2:04
So, like I've always known, I'm trans. I've always struggled with it all my life. But yeah, I didn't start thinking about it till I was about 40. My coming out story is I was basically married at the time and the woman I was married to knew, but she didn't want it to continue any further. I realized it was gonna be more than like a phase because I'd had continue any further. I realised it was going to be more than like a phase because I'd had it all my life and it was time to move it on. So we unfortunately divorced, but I had in my head this idea that I'd be an entertainer as a woman and that would be my way of dealing with it you do sound like someone whose life began at 40, then pretty much yeah we'll come on to your 40 plus years then, but let's go back a bit, shall we?
Emma Goswell: 2:49
to your childhood. Were you growing up in London, and what was that like? What was your family situation like when you were? You knew you were trans as a kid, presumably yeah.
Jenny: 2:58
So I knew there was something different going on with my body and my mind. So when I was a kid I grew up in Woking, grew up on a little council estate with my mum didn't know me dad. I've got a brother and a sister and my sister had always better toys than I did, um, and I, she, she did, but I've got like a mechanical sort of. So I'm diagnosed ADHD with autistic traits. She had this little thing that made Barbie's hair braid, like it was a twisty machine, so you pressed the trigger and it twisted the hair and then it braided it.
Jenny: 3:34
I was more obsessed with the mechanics of the toy, but also that you could make beautiful hair, if that makes sense. So that came as a second. But yeah, growing up I didn't do anything about it because I grew up on a state that's very, very boys heavy and with the boys you hear in their conversations that they were very sort of misogynistic and girls on the estate were almost like pieces of meat and that lesser people and this would have been the 80s, would it when you were?
Jenny: 4:02
growing up. So, yeah, that must have been so. I was born in 75, so sort of seven, eight, yeah, early 80s, and then I started to go into my shell then and hide Jenny and really sort of build a character who was called Matt, or Matthew was the name at the time, and then it was just years and years of just building that character and trying to hide and oppress and how difficult was that?
Emma Goswell: 4:28
were other kids clocking you? Were they calling you out for not being as laddish as they were, for example?
Jenny: 4:36
this is a funny story, so the voice I have at the minute, the accent that I have, is not a woken accent, it's basically I from watching telly and seeing other people. I created this accent because I want it to be laddish Like yeah, yeah, boys innit. Because I had a real sort of high-pitched femme voice I run around on my toes and stuff like that, which I loved. But I went full in on this character, yeah.
Emma Goswell: 5:04
And you can't shift it, then I can't.
Jenny: 5:06
No, because people say why hasn't your voice changed with your transition? But people don't know that it doesn't. You have to train your voice and most people I know have said and I agree that my voice is me. I don't want to change my voice. Yeah, that's interesting. Yeah, it's alarming for some people when I answer the phone and they go can I speak to Jenny? And I go, yeah, this is Jenny. And they go can I speak to Jenny, can you get her? And I'm like, yeah, this is Jenny. Oh, I'm so sorry.
Emma Goswell: 5:36
Well, they haven't had their trans awareness training, have they Clearly not. So were other boys teasing you then Were they saying what's with the voice? What's with the walking on tiptoes?
Jenny: 5:45
Yeah, yeah, like I was called gay for so many years, Even my brother. Like my brother, I love him to bits now and he's really super supportive, but at the time it was just a done thing, wasn't it to be horrible as lads, and people wouldn't have thought, oh, they might be trans.
Jenny: 6:01
No, it would have just been oh, you're effeminate, therefore you are gay. Yeah, there was no hate in it from my brother, but I think when he found out, we had a really deep and meaningful chat about how he felt not how I felt, no, no, no, no, because obviously he understood how I felt, but then he wanted to express that he actually felt bad for saying all those things because he didn't realize, and that gave us a bond much closer than we ever had as teenagers and kids, because we hated each other I think you do that.
Emma Goswell: 6:32
I think that's quite common, isn't it? I certainly wasn't closer to my sister until we were in our probably 30s and 40s.
Jenny: 6:39
To be honest, I think that's quite normal isn't it, so was it a bit later, when you finally came out to your brother and had that conversation so, yeah, when, when I first came out, like after I divorced, I just told my mum, my sister and my brother I was just honest with every, because I've been honest with everyone since the day I was honest with myself, if that makes sense um, but that took a lot of time.
Emma Goswell: 7:01
That was like you were nearly 40 yeah, yeah.
Jenny: 7:04
So one of the other things is shame, guilt and all those things that social sort of things put on you. You know things you see read about in the paper, like queer people getting beaten up, or you know they're hated or stuff like that, and there's a lot of that that surrounds it. So when you come, it is it's a gamble, right it's. It's a huge gamble. You could be disowned, your life could be over. You think so it?
Emma Goswell: 7:31
yeah, it took me a long time well, it sounds like you went down the route that was expected for you. You know. You, you put on your laddie voice, you acted masculine. You, you went and got married and didn't even tell your partner or anybody, just went along with what was expected, I guess yeah yeah, well, yes, so I'd never told anybody about it at all, because I'd never needed to tell anybody so what you mean? You were happy just being in the closet and knowing you were trans and carrying on.
Jenny: 7:58
I was happy but also not happy. I'm not a very confident person and I find things easier to bury and hide. So I had these things I used to dress at home and you know, again there's all of that guilt and shame again because if you get found out like you've got clothes in the wardrobe and stuff like that, who's are these, who's are these shoes in a size nine, it builds. But yeah, when I got married, the day I proposed to my wife, the day after I told her about who I was and gave her an opportunity to actually think about both things shall we get married? But also, if we're going to get married, this is actually me. She didn't take it well, I'll be honest, as I understand a lot of people wouldn't. But we had a couple of years dealing with it and then, when we got married, I think that she thought it was going to change and then it's not something that changes we said she didn't deal well with it, but she obviously decided that she loved you enough to marry you yeah, I.
Jenny: 9:03
I think maybe there was a lot of delusion on the part that you can change people like us.
Emma Goswell: 9:10
It's, it's a phase, it's a thing which is what gay people get all the time as well.
Jenny: 9:15
Yeah, oh, it's a phase, it'll pass yeah, and like when we had our, when we had our final, like, sit down, you know, and you talk about whether you're going to stay together or not, or if you're going to divorce. We actually did have a great conversation, but at the end of every sort of section of the conversation was well, this is going to end, though, isn't it? You're not going to be Jenny when there's no more Jenny, it's definitely Matt, and I had to keep saying no.
Emma Goswell: 9:41
So, yeah, we, we divorced so when you said you had the shoes and the clothes in the wardrobe, was that before you got married, or while you were married as well did was she aware that you were?
Jenny: 9:50
you were dressing so I've always dressed probably since 17, 18, as soon as you sort of have your own space and stuff like that. I knew what it was. No, I knew what it was. No, I knew what it felt like, but I didn't know what it was because there was no information at the time. I thought that I was just like a sex object, because I'd been online and looked for people like myself and all I found was sexualised stuff.
Emma Goswell: 10:21
If that makes sense About crossdressers rather than trans people.
Jenny: 10:24
Yeah, yeah, exactly that, and how people were doing it for kicks and how people would go around each other's houses. So when I was in that phase, I wanted to meet other people, but if you did, you run a big gauntlet that you're going to go around and get get involved in like a sex party or something like that, which is not what I wanted.
Emma Goswell: 10:43
I wanted information and reassurance presumably, if you're doing it, from 17 we're talking. You know, sorry to age you again, but this is pre-internet isn't it? This is you know this is what we were struggling with in the 80s. I had the same with my sexuality. You were going to libraries and looking at books. You know you couldn't just look stuff up online, could you?
Jenny: 11:00
and, and I would say I didn't know a single queer person until I was about 25. Gosh, not a single queer person. I didn't even experience a club, anything like that. I went out and did heterosexual boys stuff, watched football, went to the pub. That was it for years.
Emma Goswell: 11:20
I mean, there probably were gay clubs around where you were, but not necessarily trans support groups. But you said you were bullied for being gay. Did it ever cross your mind? Did you ever get confused and think well, maybe I'm gay?
Jenny: 11:31
I sometimes still do. Ok, it's an odd. I find being gay an odd concept because it's really really difficult to explain, because I see being gay as a bigger umbrella, like being queer, like under the queer umbrella. So when someone said to me I was gay, I didn't see it as a sort of a boy on boy thing. I always saw it as a, as a section of society, which it turned out to be, because I didn't feel I was into boys. I was never into boys and I knew I wasn't, because as a teenager you know boys are always getting their willies out and wanging them about and stuff like that, and I never thought oh, hello Again with boys.
Jenny: 12:13
you'd look at porno magazines and stuff like that. I'd always think, my God, that bra is really nice she's wearing, isn't it? I wonder if that would fit me. That used to be my first thoughts, or what would I look like? I would imagine myself as that woman, but because it's in a sort of explicit form that they have been put into your brain as well.
Emma Goswell: 12:33
that that's what women are so when you had all that time just sort of dressing at home, did you ever get caught out by anyone because you were trying to keep it all secret, weren't you for so many years?
Jenny: 12:44
I would say there were loads of times that mysterious things happened in my house that people couldn't explain. My mum found a pair of tights once. My girlfriend at the time certainly didn't wear tights. So when my mum found the tights she thought I was seeing somebody else and had a real, real go at me that I was cheating on my girlfriend.
Emma Goswell: 13:07
What did you say to her?
Jenny: 13:09
I just said that a friend of mine must have put them in my bag at a party or something. So when you get dressed and do stuff you almost have to document it and then reverse it to never get caught. So it's like a steps thing. I was really militant with it, I didn't to never get caught. So it's like a steps thing. I was really militant with it, I didn't want to get caught. But occasionally you'd walk out the house and you'd be walking down the road and you go oh no, I left a shoe out. And if you've got like a high heel shoe at home, how are you going to explain that in a size nine? So yeah, mysterious things would appear at people's houses and I would just have to make excuses, or they'd make an excuse up and go oh, it must be this.
Emma Goswell: 13:50
And then you're just playing hard I mean, that's difficult logistically and mentally for you to go with, isn't it?
Jenny: 13:56
yes, yeah, and one of the other things which I didn't say is when you, when you're a secret dresser, you can't have time to to to buy clothes. You just buy stuff on the fly. So you're walking through a shop and it's quite empty and you see an opportunity. You don't necessarily see an item of clothes. You think this is it, I've got to buy something, and you just grab stuff. It's almost like um dale winton's supermarket sweep. You just grab stuff. It's almost like Dale Winton's supermarket sweep. You just grab stuff, buy it and get out of the shop.
Emma Goswell: 14:30
So you weren't trying stuff on, you didn't feel confident enough to do that.
Jenny: 14:33
No, it was grab and go so you'd get home with the most wildest stuff, stuff that probably didn't fit, stuff that wasn't suited to you. So sometimes when I dressed, I'm glad I didn't ever got found out, because I must have looked. A state, absolute state.
Jenny: 14:51
I mean I'm laughing, but I mean that must have destroyed you as well well, I think I've got a really, really eclectic dress sense now and I think that's why I think that's why you just accept your fate. Also, as a trans person, your dysphoria is in different places and mine was having breasts and I obsessed over breasts, so I used to make my own and I experimented with so many different things. And one time I experimented I made like a paste out of flour and water and I put it in some like little balloons and that worked. But then I moved on. But I forgot about those balloons and they sat behind my drawers for about a year and a half and then one day they must have popped, because when I came home my mum was almost fumigating my room upstairs because obviously what was in those balloons had festered and gone moldy and then exploded all over the walls. And because it was an artifact, then no one knew what it was. No one knew it was a balloon full of paste. It was just. What is this?
Jenny: 16:00
I just said must have been food gone down the back of the jaws. Yeah, like seeds as well. I used to put seeds in socks and you know that's great, but if you're out in the park it's going to attract a lot of wildlife, isn't it?
Emma Goswell: 16:13
is that what happened? No, but I do like to joke about it so it sounds like you went through quite a lot of years of just you know dressing at home and your own, and then, finally, when you met your long-term partner and proposed you, came out to them, but then it was a while before you told anyone else. Then, was it?
Jenny: 16:32
Yeah, because we were in a like a phase of her getting used to it. I'd been used to it for obviously 20, 30 years or however long it was. I wanted her to get used to it because I wanted to give her as much time and understanding to understand me to make a decision, but she didn't want to. I think she just sort of pulled the shutters down and we tried a few things. She said, okay, why don't you just be yourself as Jenny for like two weeks and we see how it gets on. And that lasted a day because I had a parcel turned up for for Jenny and she took the parcel in because she was so taken aback by it being, for my trans self, the world outside coming in really hit with her. So she sort of was like no, so we kept it a secret for two years and were you still dressing at home in front of her and she was okay.
Jenny: 17:30
No, no, no, not in front of her, no, no.
Emma Goswell: 17:33
So you'd have to just go to your room, or something.
Jenny: 17:35
Yeah, really. Yeah, it was a strange time when I look back on it. It was a very, very inhibited phase that probably should have stopped early on. But I really don't like confrontation or letting people down, so I sort of went on the back foot and tried to please as much as humanly possible, which just wasn't enough well, yeah, I'm guessing that's not really you being you.
Emma Goswell: 17:58
Is it just being able to dress up in the evening in your own bedroom and not presenting yourself to even your partner? That's quite a lot of pressure on you, isn't it?
Jenny: 18:08
oh yeah, I think it's a lot of pressure. Generally, it's almost like a not regal. I met somebody once online, who's who turned out to actually be really nice, but she said I'll come round and I'll get dressed, and you get dressed. And I'm like, yeah, cool, but then what do we do? And she went well, we just do normal stuff, like watch the television and things like that, and that felt really really good because you could be yourself, but you were still behind closed doors. So again it's that like I like this, but now I have to turn it off and that's really, really difficult and then when did you have the confidence to actually set foot out the house as Jenny?
Jenny: 18:45
because that sounds like it was a big build up to that moment.
Emma Goswell: 18:47
That's how I came out in comedy.
Jenny: 18:47
I'd never been out of the house as Jenny, because that sounds like it was a big build up to that moment. That's how I came out in comedy. I'd never been out of the house as Jenny ever and I built this character. So basically, jenny was created as an entertainer. So if anybody found out or found that I'd closed in the house, that my wife could say, oh no, it's just, it's just jenny's. Uh, it's just jenny's thing, she does, she's an entertainer. So I built it as a cover. So then when, when we divorced, I hadn't taken jenny anywhere because it hadn't happened and I thought well, I can do two for one here. I can go and be a comedian but also set for out of the house. So I did. I got dressed as Jenny and went to the Admiral Duncan in Soho in London and entered a competition as a comedian. That's it Never been out. And how did that go? It went exceptionally well, god.
Emma Goswell: 19:42
But what was that moment like? Even just stepping foot out of the house as Jenny, as a 40-something-year-old.
Jenny: 19:48
Horrid, absolutely horrid. I lived in a set of flats, so you know the connecting bits between you, so I was sweating all the way down there, hoping no one in my flats would come out and see me. I had to go through my town. I'd been there 30 years. I got a train, some at the train station, and this is all completely on your own. Yeah, I think, as train, some at the train station, and this is all completely on your own. Yeah, I think as well, though, because I had sort of a backup that I was an entertainer. Jenny B-side was the character that I created, because Matt at the time was the A-side, so I was just saying that she was the B-side. All right, yeah, so if anybody saw me, I could say, oh, I'm just going to a drag show or something like that. It was still a cover. But I remember walking across Waterloo Bridge in a dress, and it was a windy, cold night and the wind was whipping up my dress and I was thinking this isn't all it's cracked up to be, is it?
Ben: 20:42
Oh my goodness.
Emma Goswell: 20:43
But you stepped foot in the Admiral Duncan and did you feel like you'd come home, that you'd met your people, and it went well.
Jenny: 20:50
It was. It's such a weird thing to explain. But yeah, as soon as you walk through that door, you're like these are my people. I'm surrounded by my people. You know, I walked in and not one person looked at me. I was like, yeah, this is how it should be.
Emma Goswell: 21:02
And had you been to a gay club before that?
Jenny: 21:05
no, I'd never been anywhere like that, as Jenny this Jenny really was created that day when I set foot out of that house and you did the gig and did you come out as being trans during the gig?
Emma Goswell: 21:18
I mean, what did you say to the crowd?
Jenny: 21:20
I didn't say anything. I think everybody just presumed I was a drag queen and I was happy to go with that because I didn't have to explain anything, to be honest. I then got booked to do some more stuff which was on the drag circuit and then I realized slowly that I wasn't drag and I was more and I needed more. So that's when I moved away from drag into the comedy circuit.
Emma Goswell: 21:43
A lot of fun so was that your first comedy gig as well.
Jenny: 21:47
I'd done some gigs on my guitar singing funny songs, but yeah, as a comedy gig, that was my first.
Emma Goswell: 21:52
My God, this is a lot of firsts. In one day, jenny, your first time leaving the house as Jenny, and your first gig and all on your own, and the first time you went to a gay bar yeah, I mean.
Jenny: 22:03
Yeah, what a day. Do you know? What I'd done as well is? I'm a fantasist, I'm not a realist, so I build fantasies in my head and at the time there was a programme on telly called Drag Queens of London, with Bag of Chips and Son of a Tutu I think they were all on there and they were all nuts and I just thought they're my people, I need to meet these people. So the competition I did was it's like UK drag. It wasn't drag race.
Emma Goswell: 22:31
No, but it's held in a bar or a club, isn't it? But it was sort of pre-drag race being in the UK, wasn't it? Yeah, yeah.
Jenny: 22:37
So I went in for that. So as soon as I saw a bag of chips and that because they were my judges I just knew that I'd done the right thing. You know, I'd stepped into a world that I'd built in my head. It's not like that on the street. So obviously, on the train home I got loads of stick, but there was still part of me. That was like you found your goal. Keep going back to it.
Emma Goswell: 22:59
Keep going back to it so would you say it was a positive experience all in all, that first night massively positive.
Jenny: 23:05
Yeah, glad I did it.
Emma Goswell: 23:07
I bet you couldn't sleep that night, could you? There must have been a lot going around your head.
Jenny: 23:11
I've still got a video of my performance of that night. I came second in the competition. I was supposed to come first, but because I wasn't traditional drag miming they couldn't put me on in other venues.
Emma Goswell: 23:28
So I was too good, one might say let me ask what were you doing for a career before this moment?
Jenny: 23:37
uh, I was an animator. So, yeah, always been creative and with creative people, very open, arty expressive people. You know they're my people.
Emma Goswell: 23:47
So it sounds like this was a bit of a watershed moment. You know you have gone out of the house, as Jenny, you have, you know, really transformed your life. Then how long was it before you started telling people like your family?
Jenny: 24:01
I kind of think that people knew and that I've never really really told people. It's just sort of been an amalgamous I don't know what the word is, you know when it just flows into something. When I left my wife, I told my family that this character that I created is going to go on stage and stuff like that. So I did have people around me to protect me, which is good, because I did a gig not long into my journey in London and I got beaten up by a big gang of youths outside Waterloo train station. I got mugged, beaten up I think there's about 14 of them just sort of saw me, decided that was it. But I rang my mum and my mum just talked me through it. You know this school. You know, go here, see if you can see this person get in a cab. Come straight home, I'll be waiting for you. And I think if I hadn't had that then I probably wouldn't have told anybody that that experience had happened to me did you tell the police as well?
Emma Goswell: 25:05
did it all get reported?
Jenny: 25:06
I didn't tell the police because I just it's shock and shame, isn't it? We don't do it because we don't want to be. We don't want to put people out because we feel like we're the we're guilty. Lots of people said I should, but I didn't want to at the time. It was just too much. Just too much for me. But there were people there, you know there were. There were people around that weren't involved in the fight, that did nothing, and even when I was sort of sat on the steps of Walloo Station crying my eyes out, no one did anything. So it was lucky that I had my mum, that I could ring up as support.
Emma Goswell: 25:41
So I kind of I'm so sorry that happened to you. It's just horrific, it really is.
Jenny: 25:46
I look back on it and it is, but at the same time I think it could have been so much worse. I could have been somewhere that wasn't populated or or out, and that happens to people all the time. When it starts, you don't think it's going to start, you know your mind goes, this isn't going to happen. And then it happens and it's just a world of pain.
Emma Goswell: 26:06
It's horrible but your mum was there to save the day and she accepted you as Jenny.
Jenny: 26:13
Yeah, I think that she knew why it had happened, like it was a homophobic or transphobic attack, and that she leaned into the situation more. She was more supportive, rather than I just had a scuffle for you. You know, maybe I was drunk.
Emma Goswell: 26:30
Did you have a proper like heart-to-heart with her about it and about Jenny?
Jenny: 26:34
I did, and it sort of turned out that my mum had a friend who was trans in in her youth, so her friend used to dress up and come to Woking but then they used to go to the cinema so she could hide away with them all, so they would sort of protect her. And that really really sort of bound me to my mum because I knew that she definitely understood what it was like. So, yeah, yeah, telling my family and parents felt something like my mum felt like something I really had to do because I needed some form of protection. I did, you see, I mean someone to talk to and bond with in case something went wrong.
Emma Goswell: 27:11
Did she ask you why it took you so long?
Jenny: 27:13
I think all my family did, but I think they also understand that it's not just them accepting it, it's the world around you, because everything has to change. You're going to present differently. You want people to talk to you the same. It's a difficult decision, really difficult decision.
Emma Goswell: 27:34
You said you had another sibling, you had a sister as well.
Jenny: 27:36
I got a sister yeah, my sister I came out to first. I talked to my sister about everything, and the way I came out to my sister was I invited her around with something important to tell her, and when she got there, I'd got all my clothes out, all my female clothes, and just laid them all out around the front room. And when she came in, she took not a single bit of notice of it. I think she thought they were my wife at the time, uh, and she went what is it? What is it? Tell me? Tell me, hope it's nothing bad, hope it's nothing bad.
Jenny: 28:06
And I went you see all these clothes. And she went, yeah, I went, they're mine. And just the look on her face was like, oh, like everything clicked into place. But then she had a massive cry and she said oh my God, you've been through this on your own all this time. Why didn't you tell me? And I never thought of that. I never thought of that. So, yeah, she's been super protective, super fun, super brilliant. My brother's the same. I've got seven nieces and they are all brilliant girls and all support me fully and funnily as well and do you still speak to the ex-wife, that sort of distant relationship now?
Jenny: 28:42
yeah, she doesn't want anything to do with me. Instead of getting divorced, we got annulled, so it's wiped clean from history. So there's no connection of me to her.
Emma Goswell: 28:55
It's sad, but you know, some people make their choices so how long after your divorce did you move to Manchester? Then let's talk about this move, because that sounds quite a big moment in your life as well then because I came out as Jenny B side an entertainer.
Jenny: 29:09
I never thought it would go anywhere. I thought it was just a cover. But then I got really good at it, or people thought I was good at it, and then it started to build. And then I started to build as a comedian and I started gigging all over the UK. And then I gigged in Manchester one day and I just really, really, really liked it. I came back sort of three or four times. So about five years into my journey I wanted to change my life like real big change. So I wanted to step up in comedy, get rid of my job, come out properly, properly as Jenny and Manchester just was calling to me.
Emma Goswell: 29:48
And transition, presumably.
Jenny: 29:50
Yeah, yeah. So everything again happened as one big one, push, push. That seems to be the story of my life, doesn't it? Wait till the last minute and then just do everything at once so you moved to manchester, presumably not knowing that many people.
Jenny: 30:03
If you'd lived in surrey and london for most of your life well over 40 years- I didn't know anybody and again leaving it to the last minute the girl that I moved in with. So I moved into an Airbnb for a month and we got on so well that I've been there well, I was there two years. I've only just moved and but even that was last minute I didn't know anybody. You know, I knew a few comedians, but not solidly, and I'd say even now, only this past year have I really started to meet people.
Emma Goswell: 30:34
But it's going well. You're loving Manchester still and you're basically completely out then, as Jenny. And how does it go down on the stage? Do you talk?
Jenny: 30:46
about trans issues. I kind of throw it in people's faces. Here's an example when I used to do comedy as, uh, jenny Beast, I wore a wig and heels and short skirt really sort of super femme, um. And when I'd sort of not talk about it, people would really sort of freeze up because they didn't know how to act with a trans person in front of them. Being funny, should we laugh at the trans person, should we not? And he used to confuse them. So I built into the beginning of my set some stuff which was just really stupid about being trans to make everybody laugh. So we can all go okay, this is comedy, let's move on oh good, okay, so what sort of stuff, would you say?
Jenny: 31:28
I had a song which was just one line and I still do it now which basically says it's hard to wear a thong when you've got bollocks and that just opens everyone up to okay, this is fine. You know, let's not worry about the person on stage. It's comedy first. So that's what I do. I'm very in your face with it, but in a very playful kind of way, and that's always been my comedy persona. But I've had lots of people afterwards say to me you know, I do queer gigs down on Canal Street. I've had trans people come up to me and go we don't see anybody like you in comedy. This is so nice and you are joking about us in such a funny way that we love it. And I also get people that come up to me and go hey, my daughter's trans. What should I do? I don't know.
Emma Goswell: 32:23
But it sounds like you've become a role model, because you're right when I think about it. You know we have got to a stage where there's quite a lot of trans actors out and about on the small screen and the big screen, but I can't really name that many trans comedians no, there's, there's, uh, jordan Gray, who's doing great things. I'm sure there's a few, but definitely the minority of a minority yeah, yeah, I don't see many on the circuit and how do you find the promoters react to you?
Emma Goswell: 32:49
because you know, I've got quite a lot of friends who are female comedians and I've heard them say, you know, there's still this bollocks about oh women aren't funny, we won't book loads of women on the lineup, we can only have one, you know, do you get discriminated against because you're a woman and you're trans?
Jenny: 33:06
I do. You know what I used to. I don't anymore because I've proven myself. You know I am funny and I know I am because people book me and I get messages and stuff like that. But there's a running joke from some of the boys on the circuit that the only funny women are men, which is doubling down on that and it's horrible. But there's a massive movement in comedy now from to to support and strive and push women in comedy. I did a night the other night at the Frog and Bucket called Femmes and Them's, which is just for well. Femmes and Them's yeah, it covers everyone who's not a straight white male, I suppose. Yeah brilliant.
Jenny: 33:43
More of it. I say it's lovely. It was one of the best gigs I've done in a very long time because everyone's there to support as well as do comedy.
Emma Goswell: 33:52
so Well, support as well as do comedy so well. I feel like we're almost coming towards the end. I always like to ask people if they would have any advice for other people who are maybe questioning their sexuality or gender. What would you say to people you know in your situation, you know when you were in the closet for decades? That's a long time to be in the closet. What advice would you give to anyone else going through the same?
Jenny: 34:14
I would say nowadays, get information, get as much information as you possibly can, and then make a decision about who you're going to tell and who is going to be your tribe. You know, go to meet people in meetups. Or you know there are groups where you don't have to go to a nightclub, but there are just groups, walks, poetry, all sorts. You know, just go and be among your people that's what I'd say and then decide whether you're going to come out to them or not.
Emma Goswell: 34:46
Well, you certainly went and found your people who knew it would be bag of chips and people like that.
Jenny: 35:00
I mean, not everyone's got the confidence to go and stand on a stage and enter a comedy competition and go out, you know, dressed for the first time. Yeah, I've kind of I've always been an entertainer, so you know that that path was there. Taking it was hard, but the path was there. But, yeah, if you fancy doing it, get into comedy. It's a wonderful world, it is supportive these days and, yeah, give it a go.
Emma Goswell: 35:14
You don't get heckled then, or just normal heckling.
Jenny: 35:17
I very rarely get heckled Because I give it. I put it out there so much on stage. I think people get frightened that I'm going to go near them.
Emma Goswell: 35:28
So what next for Jenny, then? Where can we come and see you and watch some gigs?
Jenny: 35:34
If you follow me online Jenny Hart comedy or look up, look me up online you can find out where I am. I'm all over the place and I'm going to Edinburgh in August as well for a show called Seahorse all about being trans, and not having a fanny is the main crux of it, so yeah, catch you in edinburgh then cool, it'd be good. Yeah, like I'm gigging, most times it's my full-time job, so you'll catch me around what a total and utter legend.
Emma Goswell: 36:04
So good to chat to jenny hart, so do catch her around. You can find her on x as at j B-sides, and also do check out her Edinburgh show if you can. It's called Lezard Now. Next episode, we are off to the USA to meet Ben Green. He's the author of my Child is Trans, now what? And he told me that one of the first people he came out to about his gender identity was his girlfriend when he was a young teenager. He said that even though they'd only been on a few dates, he was confident that she'd accept him.
Ben: 36:38
She honestly was amazing. I mean I could go over to her house. She also told her parents, she told her mom and her brother and so I could come over and like, when I ordered my first chest binder, I ordered it to her house because I couldn't get it in the mail at my house, and then her family let me wear a tie to dinner and her mom called me Ben and that I had a space I could go most weekends where I knew that I was going to get seen as I was, was honestly really outstanding.