J.T. LeRoy (based on an extraordinary true story) and Tomboy explore what happens when two people explore a different identity.
J.T. LeRoy
Laura Dern with Kristen Stewart in ‘J.T. LeRoy’. Source: Steven Ackerman
LeRoy presented himself as a recluse crippled by social anxiety and there was a good reason for this; he didn’t exist. J.T. LeRoy was actually the pen name for mid-30s female writer Laura Albert, who’d come up with the name years earlier when calling a suicide hotline. At first, Albert kept up the charade through emails, faxes and even phone calls where she put on a Southern drawl and pretended to be LeRoy. But when that proved to be not enough, especially once Italian actress Asia Argento started negotiating for movie rights, the writer came up with a desperate ploy.
In 1999, Albert cajoled her partner’s 18-year-old sibling Savannah Knoop into portraying LeRoy at various events, even on speaking tours overseas. Wearing a daggy blond wig, dark sunglasses and talking in a decidedly non-West Virginian accent, the gender non-conforming Knoop somehow fooled everyone for the next six years – including some of the world’s biggest stars like Argento, Courtney Love and U2’s Bono – until the hoax was finally exposed by the media.
The 2018 English-language film J.T. LeRoy, based on Knoop’s 2007 memoir Girl Boy Girl: How I Became JT LeRoy, stars Laura Dern as the force-of-nature Albert and Kristen Stewart as the vulnerable Knoop, who swings from being conflicted by what they’re doing to revelling in the attention they’re receiving.
“It feels like I’m making something,” Knoop confesses in one scene, “like a performance, and I’m so compelled to do it.”
The real Knoop reveals there were other reasons, too, for their actions.
“I think my experience [as LeRoy] helped me to dismantle the ways we’re supposed to be and to keep questioning how something feels, which parts matter to me,” they tell . “I think [my gender neutrality] was always there, and JT helped to articulate it for me.”
Argento – who had an affair with Knoop/LeRoy and, not surprisingly, was furious at being hoodwinked – is not in the film. Instead, director Justin Kelly (who co-wrote the screenplay) reimagines her as French actress Eva (Diane Kruger), who’s shown to be as manipulative as Albert in getting what she wants from Knoop/LeRoy. Eventually, the pair’s elaborate deception falls apart. This comes as something of a relief to Knoop but also a source of frustration as they feel their intentions were misunderstood.
Amazingly, Albert and Knoop emerged from the scandal relatively unscathed and both have gone on to great success in their careers as a writer and artist, respectively. It seems the only people who may have been hurt were the gullible celebrities who fell for the hoax. Although, give credit to Courtney Love for being a good sport about it – she even has a small part in the film.
J.T. LeRoy is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
Tomboy
Zoé Héran in ‘Tomboy’. Source: Distributor
Laure pretends to be a boy called Mickaël and is quickly accepted into the group, also attracting the attention of Lisa (Jeanne Disson), who develops a bit of a crush on Mickaël.
The film cuts back and forth between quiet scenes of Laure’s home life – interacting with her heavily pregnant mum (Sophie Cattani), loving dad (Mathieu Demy) and adorable little sister Jeanne (Malonn Lévana) – and the energetic social cut-and-thrust of Mickaël with his rowdy new friends as they play football, go swimming and generally muck about in the woods near their homes.
Laure goes to great lengths to maintain the ruse, but a violent altercation one afternoon leads to the truth coming out.
Writer/director Céline Sciamma, who regularly explores the concepts of female gender fluidity and sexual identity in her movies, has said that Laure’s decision to masquerade as a boy isn’t a conscious decision but more a spur-of-the-moment thing. She says basing the story around childhood interested her.
“It’s a time where everybody pretends to be someone else for an afternoon,” Sciamma tells . “Everyone makes up stories about themselves. I made it with several layers, so a transsexual person can say, ‘That was my childhood’ and a heterosexual woman can also say it.”
Tomboy is now streaming at SBS On Demand.
