The Acolyte creator Leslye Headland: I dont believe Ive created queer content
As we discussed last week, Disney+’s new Star Wars series The Acolyte has, predictably, been controversial thanks to the whiny fanboys who can’t get over that the series has a queer female showrunner and a diverse cast. Just last week, they got into a fight with the online website Wookiepedia, sending death threats to one of their editors for updating a very minor character’s age simply because The Acolyte’s canon contradicted older information from the book series about how old this character is. They are the f-cking worst.
Despite what those toxic jerks would have you think, showrunner Leslye Headland is a lifelong fan who has been creating Star Wars stories in her mind since she was a child. Like a boss, she made it happen on her own by convincing Lucasfilm CEO Kathleen Kennedy to give her a chance to make The Acolyte a reality. The series, which takes place 100 years before the events of The Phantom Menace, had the highest opening day viewers for Disney+ this year. Headland recently sat down for an interview with The Hollywood Reporter to talk about the series, being the first openly queer person to helm a live-action Star Wars project, having so much LGBTQ representation within the cast, the hysteria from the Dark Side of the Fandom, and how she feels about people calling the series the “gayest Star Wars” ever.
Her Star Wars origin story: In 2019, Leslye Headland was walking the blue carpet at the Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker premiere when she was asked if she had any Star Wars ideas of her own. Headland responded that she’s had Star Wars stories in mind since childhood and, in an Oscar-worthy performance, urged Lucasfilm boss Kathleen Kennedy to give her a shot. Well, the truth is that she was already hard at work on what would later be known as Star Wars: The Acolyte, becoming the first openly queer person to create a live-action project set in a galaxy far, far away.
On all of the LGBTQ+ representation: Headland immediately envisioned The Hate U Give star Amandla Stenberg in The Acolyte’s dual lead role of identical twins Osha and Mae Aniseya. She even had concept art created with Stenberg in mind before approaching her about the role. Stenberg, who identifies as nonbinary and gay, is joined by Russian Doll’s Charlie Barnett (who has said he came out as gay at age 13) as the fastidious Jedi Knight Yord Fandar. And Barnett is actually one of two Russian Doll actors to play a Jedi on The Acolyte, as Headland’s wife, Rebecca Henderson, plays Jedi Master Vernestra Rwoh from the Star Wars: The High Republic multimedia project.
She doesn’t think she created queer content: [A]s someone who generally pushes back on the notion that queer artists are capable of creating only queer or queer-coded art, Headland remains perplexed by a recent viral moment from her show’s L.A. junket. A journalist posited to her and Stenberg that The Acolyte is “arguably the gayest Star Wars by a considerable margin.” The writer-director and her star had fun with the line of inquiry, but now that the exchange has generated a bevy of responses, the question of what makes a piece of mass entertainment “gay” is one this queer artist continues to ponder in earnest. “I was surprised by the question. Amandla and I just burst out laughing because that’s our knee-jerk reaction to being asked that, but to be honest, I don’t know what the term ‘gay’ means in that sense,” admits Headland, adding, “I don’t believe that I’ve created queer, with a capital Q, content.”
Stop being “reductive” and pay attention to the story: Perhaps the most queer-adjacent story point is that the 24-year-old Aniseya twins were born to two moms, Mother Aniseya (Jodie Turner-Smith) and Mother Koril (Margarita Levieva), whom plenty of internet commentators are calling a lesbian couple. The two led an exiled coven of witches, where they practiced their own interpretation of the Force, known as the Thread. It’s eventually implied, not confirmed, that Aniseya used her brand of Force powers to impregnate Koril with the twins, but for Headland, their relationship is more circumstantial. “They’re in a matriarchal society. As a gay woman, I knew it would read that their sexuality is queer, but there also aren’t any men in their community,” she explains. “So a closeness between the two of them would be natural. It seemed plot-driven. I would say it’s really reductive to call them lesbians. I think it means you’re not really paying attention to this story.”
She’s “proud” to create something that inspires queer people: Headland stresses that she is by no means running from any material that might speak to queer audience members. “I’m proud of being a gay woman who’s accomplished this feat, and certainly, if my content is called queer, I don’t want to disown whatever queerness is in the show. I would be proud to create something that inspired queer people,” states Headland.
Gay does not make something bad, you weirdos: “Honestly, I feel sad that people would think that if something were gay, that that would be bad. It makes me feel sad that a bunch of people on the internet would somehow dismantle what I consider to be the most important piece of art that I’ve ever made.”
I totally understand what Headland is saying. She’s happy to inspire other queer people to become creators in their own right but she also doesn’t look at her work and go, “How can I make this gayer?” She’s telling a story and that story happens to involve a coven of women who Force-created twins that are played by an actor of color who just happens to be pansexual and nonbinary. That’s the twins’ origins and it doesn’t have to be a thing, it can just be what it is. It’s like what Schitt’s Creek set out to do with the character of David, a pansexual man that ended up marrying another man. They didn’t want to do some big dramatic storyline about teaching acceptance in a small town. Instead, they just wanted that small town to already be accepting without any additional drama. That’s what should be happening with Star Wars. It’s a big galaxy and these storylines should just exist without the extra noise. I do think that while the Darth Fanboys are trying to be the loudest voices in the room, they are being drowned out by the overwhelming majority of decent, kind accepting Star Wars fans who are just looking for good storytelling. I really like The Acolyte so far and am looking forward to seeing where the story will go.
Photos credit: Cat Morley / Avalon, Getty and via Instagram
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