Several years ago, the world was shocked when Lana Wachowski, co-director of movies such as Matrix, Speed Racer, and Cloud Atlas, and co-creator of the Netflix show Sense8, came out as transgender. Though the Wachowskis are notoriously shy around the press, Lana became one of the most high-profile transgender people in entertainment. Now, in a surprising twist, the other Wachowski has also come out as transgender.
Formerly Andy Wachowski, Lilly Wachowski came out in a statement to the Windy City Times out of fear that the tabloids like The Daily Mail would out her first.
About this experience, she said:
My sister Lana and I have largely avoided the press. I find talking about my art frustratingly tedious and talking about myself a wholly mortifying experience. I knew at some point I would have to come out publicly. You know, when you’re living as an out transgender person it’s … kind of difficult to hide. I just wanted—needed some time to get my head right, to feel comfortable.
[…]
It was the “news” organization that had played a huge part in the national public outing of Lucy Meadows, an elementary school teacher and trans woman in the UK. An editorial in the “not-a-tabloid” demonized her as a damaging influence on the children’s delicate innocence and summarized “he’s not only trapped in the wrong body, he’s in the wrong job.” The reason I knew about her wasn’t because she was transgender, it was because three months after the Daily Mail article came out, Lucy committed suicide.
And now here they were, at my front door, almost as if to say—
“There’s another one! Let’s drag ’em out in the open so we can all have a look!”
However, she puts more focus on the fact that she has been able to transition successfully, even in this world where transgender people are beaten, murdered, and pushed into committing suicide at frighteningly-regular rates, and that she should be happy because of it:
So I will continue to be an optimist adding my shoulder to the Sisyphean struggle of progress and in my very being, be an example of the potentiality of another world.
Lilly Wachowski
Lilly and Lana Wachowski are currently developing Sense8 Season 2, which will released on Netflix sometime in the near future.