In Full View Focusing on Trans Mascs in Media

In Full View, the podcast about trans masculine representation in film and TV, kicks off Season 2 with hosts Avi Roque and Yas Modares Ghasiri reflecting on everything Season 1 taught them. The show began with trans masc representation panels at San Diego Comic-Con, and this episode traces how those panels grew into in-depth conversations with trans and nonbinary creatives working across entertainment.

Avi and Yas revisit standout moments with their Season 1 guests. Author Aiden Thomas modeled generosity toward debut writers, and casting director Charlie of Telsey + Company explained how the industry's confusion about what trans men look like shapes who gets cast. Producer AJ Mattioli broke down the distribution and funding infrastructure that has to exist behind representation. Actor Brian Michael Smith showed what happens when a trans actor creates his own action roles, Maze Felix opened up about mental health and multi-hyphenate artistry, and musician Ryan Cassata proved that turning down American Idol can be a career move rooted in authenticity.

The hosts also talk about Hollywood's habit of over-explaining trans characters, why trans actors feel pressure to make themselves smaller, the difference between a role and a purpose, and how the podcast has become a community-building tool for trans artists and the cis collaborators who want to get it right. Plus, they introduce producer Lulu and tease upcoming Season 2 conversations with a cinematographer, a director, and more guests working behind the camera.

Chapters

00:00 Season 2 kickoff and the Comic-Con panels that started it all

03:27 Community building for trans creatives

06:16 Overdone tropes and Aiden Thomas on giving back

09:25 Casting director Charlie on what trans men look like

11:29 Going stealth, over-explaining trans characters, and Degrassi

13:49 AJ Mattioli and the infrastructure behind representation

16:23 Making your own work and Brian Michael Smith's action short

20:56 Storytelling that teaches without lecturing

23:28 Maze Felix, mental health, and finding your purpose

28:47 Ryan Cassata and choosing authenticity

33:46 Body image and on-screen expectations for trans actors

36:48 Brian Michael Smith on marketing yourself as an actor

39:40 Season 2 preview and meet the team

44:08 Finding the people who care

48:31 How to support the show

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In Full View is back for Season 2! Hosts Avi Roque and Yas return with more conversations about trans masculine representation in film, TV, music, and the entertainment industry. This trailer offers a first look at a season packed with trans and nonbinary creatives working onstage, onscreen, and behind the scenes, plus deep dives into the business decisions that shape who gets cast, funded, and paid.

Season 1 featured musician Ryan Cassata, actor and dancer Maze Felix, indie producer AJ Mattioli, and Mars from Transanta, along with episodes on trans joy, holiday movie tropes, and equity for trans masc actors. In Season 2, the hosts keep exploring queer and trans art, music, performance, and filmmaking, along with what it takes to build a sustainable creative career as a trans person in entertainment.

Season 2 premieres Thursday, October 1. Subscribe to In Full View on Podbean, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen so you never miss an episode of the podcast made for trans masculine creatives and the people who champion their work.

Aiden Thomas is the New York Times bestselling author of Cemetery Boys and the first openly trans author to hit the fiction bestseller list with a trans main character. He built one of the most dedicated readerships in YA fantasy largely without a marketing budget by talking about his characters online for six months straight before the book ever came out.

Avi and Yas get into how Aiden writes trans characters without flattening them, why bringing your full intersectional identity to your work is a creative advantage, and how publishers manufacture the myth that queer stories don't sell.

This episode goes deep on the business of YA publishing, what it took to get Cemetery Boys out there, and how Aiden is supporting trans, queer, and BIPOC writers trying to make it in an industry built against them. 

For listeners into trans books, LGBTQ publishing, queer YA fantasy, or the business side of traditional publishing, this one's worth your time.

We're watching Tomboy (2011), Céline Sciamma's tender French film about a gender non-conforming 10-year-old who introduces himself as Mickäel to kids in his new apartment building. This slice-of-life story captures the specific innocence, freedom, and fear of childhood gender exploration in ways that felt shockingly familiar to both of us.

We get personal about the boy names we secretly went by (Tom and Michael, very white of us), the moments of stolen boyhood we both experienced, and why we spent the entire film bracing for trauma that never came. Tomboy refuses to build toward violence, instead trusting the audience to understand what it costs to survive as a trans kid just trying to be seen.

We also dig into Sciamma's intentional choice to leave the protagonist's gender open to interpretation, creating space for trans men, non-binary people, lesbians, and questioning viewers to all find themselves in the story. 

Plus, we explore why trans masc representation keeps showing up in critically acclaimed indie films but rarely breaks through to mainstream Hollywood, and what that pattern means for our visibility and our paychecks.

This episode is for anyone who grew up hiding, anyone who made a Play-Doh packer, and anyone still asking what trans narratives could look like if they trusted us enough to just exist.

Tomboy is streaming on Criterion Channel if you want to watch ahead of time.

Two-time Artios Award-winning casting director Charlie Hano joins In Full View to talk about casting as a craft, how trans masculine actors can advocate for themselves in auditions, and what it takes to build a casting career when you can't study it in school.

Charlie breaks down what casting directors look for in auditions, why auditions should feel like parties instead of interrogations, and how actors can reach out to casting professionals without crossing boundaries. He also opens up about the gap in trans masculine representation in theater and film, why people don't know what trans men look like, and his vision for a world where all-cisgender casts are intentional dramaturgical choices instead of the default.

This episode is for trans actors navigating the entertainment industry, aspiring casting directors finding their path, and anyone who wants to understand how casting rooms actually work behind the scenes.

Avi and Yas dig into what trans masculine representation actually needs to create lasting change in entertainment. They explore the difference between visibility and impact, why quantity matters as much as quality, and how representation teaches audiences how to react to trans people in real life.

The hosts revisit early trans masc representation like Max from The L Word and discuss how it shaped perceptions of trans men as abandoning the queer community. They break down the trans tax, the economic barriers trans masc artists face, and the challenges that come when support programs designed for gender minorities often exclude trans men who spent most of their careers hitting the glass ceiling.

Looking ahead five years, they imagine a future where trans masc creatives hold leadership positions at studios and can build their own pathways. This episode connects representation to economic justice and asks how we create sustainable foundations for trans masc artists in the industry.

Trying to get your indie film made, but don't know where to start? Producer AJ Mattioli has been funding, producing, and distributing queer films for over a decade, and he's here to walk you through what it actually takes to bring a project to life.

AJ is a veteran indie producer who's worked across the full spectrum of queer filmmaking, handling development, financing, and post-production. He also runs a queer distribution company, getting films onto platforms like TLA, Dekkoo, and Here TV. In this episode, he breaks down the realities of indie film production, how to navigate limited budgets, and what distribution options exist once your film is finished. 

He also tackles why trans men are still stuck as side characters in mainstream projects, what needs to shift for trans masc characters to take center stage, and handling the negativity that comes with making trans and queer content.

Learn what it takes to succeed in queer indie filmmaking. Listen now.

This three-part holiday special brings warmth, tears, and some trans holiday movies! Avi and Yas start with artist and activist Mars from Transanta to talk about mutual aid, community care, and punking the holiday season. Plus, they read some letters trans youth sent in. (Prepare the tissues!) Learn more at www.transsanta.com.

Finally, the hosts take on the holiday movie industry. The holiday movie industry makes hundreds of millions of dollars. But the trans masculine representation is seriously lacking, which means the paycheck is, too. Avi and Yas talk about the few trans movies that exist, the tropes that need a rewrite, and the trans masc holiday movies they want to see.

Grab a cup of cocoa and get cozy with a holiday special that’s all trans.

The ultimate multi-hyphante, Maze Felix, joins In Full View to talk about trans masculine visibility, creative embodiment, and finding euphoria through movement. A non-binary, transmasculine, Chinese adoptee advocate, Maze gets into how to craft your character without losing your intersectional identities, building your mental health toolkit, and leading your entertainment with joy. 

They open up about getting cast as teenage boys in their 30s, being misgendered on set, and how art and advocacy work together. 

This episode is for the trans artists, the dancers, the dreamers, and anyone learning to move through the world in full view.

Episode 5 of In Full View explores how the push for trans joy impacts storytelling in entertainment, especially for transmasculine stories that are already underrepresented.

With trans masc stories so scarce, joy becomes a loaded expectation. We talk about the pressure to be “positive,” the absence of messy or morally gray roles, and how art risks being flattened for the sake of joy.

This episode asks if there’s room for joy that looks different and sometimes contradictory, and how we make space for trans joy without shutting out dramas, horror, and darker experiences. 

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