Oh I'm so nervous, ok... why are we here, why are we here?
I'm here to reintroduce myself.
And who are you reintroducing yourself as?
I am reintroducing myself as Tommy Dorfman, my pronouns are she/her
I'm still an actor,
still a writer, still a creative,
still a storyteller. And I'm also a woman.
A trans woman.
You know some people moved houses during the pandemic,
some people changed genders.
For many years, I wanted to start transitioning and I just couldn't.
And it felt really daunting and really scary to embark on that journey especially because I'm at the beginning of my career.
And what does it mean even for me to come from where I am
and the fears that I'm feeling
to find compassion and empathy towards my trans brothers and sisters
who are more disenfranchised than myself, right?
And so I think for me,
it really took everything going away.
Me alone in my bed,
trying to imagine what my life at 60 would look like.
And all I could see was a woman.
My dad always asked me like, what your why is,
like why you do what you do?
And when life feels really complicated, really hard and I feel
really depressed and I don't want to leave my bedroom.
I really do, think about
like, the children. I do, though!
I mean, I think trans and queer people and everybody
who's maybe differently abled in some way,
if you're choosing to live in a more public space,
you feel is inherent responsibility.
And I'm really cautious,
I don't feel prepared enough, qualified enough
remotely experienced enough to speak for the community as a whole,
which is why I try to keep as much of what I say personalized
to me and my experience.
Maybe if I had done this like five years ago,
I'd feel very soapboxy about it, and I'd want to like scream it
from the rooftops but it's just not where I'm at today.
And I think there's something really powerful
in choosing the moments to speak
as authentically as possible.
I feel like I haven't scratched the surface with my career or work.
Because everything I've done up until the end of last year
has been in the wrong body and not in my truth
and so much of my work as an actor was like hiding this part of myself
and then bringing life to character,
and so I think I'm just excited to play women,
trans women, cis women, women in general, non-binary femme-presenting people.
And it's funny because I loved acting but then I would hate going to work.
It always felt really uncomfortable to me.
And now I know why.
I mean, I've always felt incredibly feminine, whatever that means
on the inside, and so I don't feel like, if anything,
it's an amplification of who I am.
I don't feel this
need to kill my old self and bring this sort of "phoenix rising from the ashes,"
it's just not my experience right now.
I'm not a different person.
I don't even have a different name, right?
Like, I love my name and I want to keep my name and
give new life to my name.
Because I'm really proud of the person that I was, too.
I think that's important to acknowledge, I'm proud of who I've been
for the last however many years.
This is just a magnifying glass on Tommy, I guess
and who I am today.