Trans Visibility: Performing Gender

Why can't we give transgender people the dignity of visibility in cinema and other spaces? Does Taali perpetuate the stereotype that trans women are just men in drag? Or is acting free from the responsibility of representation of the third gender?

The recently-released OTT series ‘Taali’, featuring Sushmita Sen in a career-defining role as she tells the story of a transgender community activist Gauri Sawant, has received mixed responses, as it attempts to place a trans person in the centre of the narrative but yet again, casts a cis-actor to play a transwoman. In the backdrop of this debate, Outlook’s latest issue looks at the questions surrounding the representation of transgender persons in various forms of art, media and the public sphere.