Amazon.com premiered on Sept. 26 the first season of Transparent, a comedy-drama about a Los Angeles family coping with the news that their father has come out as transgender. This latest addition to the website’s growing original program collection has gained critical acclaim from national media sources such as The New York Times, The New Yorker, Buzzfeed and Slate.
The show’s plotline revolves around the Pferffermans, a Jewish family of five whose 70-year-old patriarch, played by Arrested Development star Jeffery Tambor, comes out to his grown children and ex-wife as female “Maura” and the drama that ensues.
The Pferffermans are an eclectic bunch with as many quirks as any modern, wealthy family from California: the married eldest daughter Sarah (Amy Landecker) struggles with her sexuality when her college girlfriend reappears; successful music producer Josh (Jay Duplass) is a womanizer who is anxious to start a family; the youngest daughter, Ali (Gaby Hoffman), is ten years out of college and still has not chosen a career path and ex-wife Shelly (Judith Light) is a classically neurotic mother who scoffs at her daughter’s choice of tofu schmear.
Jill Soloway, the show’s creator and director, is well versed in the intricacies of the trans community; in 2011, her father came out as a trans woman. While Soloway denies that the show is in any way autobiographical, the theme of unconventional family dynamics is one she has previously explored as well. In her 2013 indie comedy-drama Afternoon Delight, a Los Angeles stay-at-home mother impulsively invites a young exotic dancer into her home in an attempt to save the girl from the industry.
Like Afternoon Delight, Transparent is clearly a product of our time. Characters make references to the dating app Tinder, California’s relaxed medical marijuana regulations and the growing alphabet that is the ever-evolving LGBTQQ community — for those unfamiliar with the expanded acronym, the Qs stand for “queer” and “questioning.” Issues of gender, sexuality and modern relationships flow throughout the show’s narrative, allowing for Transparent to showcase a variety of trans actors such as Alexandra Billings, Ian Harvie and Zackary Drucker.
Although the show has received some criticism for casting straight male actor Tambor as Maura rather than choosing a trans actor, these arguments fail to account the fact that the series tracks the beginning of Maura’s gender transition: The character has yet to explore hormone or surgical options. Nonetheless, it will be interesting to see how future seasons handle the progression of Maura’s transition.
Transparent also depicts how American perceptions of gender and sexuality have changed in the past 25 years. The show features flashbacks to the late 80s through the mid 90s, when Maura secretly questions her gender through cross-dressing and goes to great lengths to conceal her activities from her family. Unlike other current series, Transparent takes risks cinematically by melding moments of past and present and blurring the lines between reality and character projection.
Overall, Transparent succeeds in opening conversations of gender and sexuality to a broader audience, while clarifying misconceptions and answering questions for characters and viewers alike along the way. Transparent’s original subject matter and social commentary validate Amazon’s in-house content. The show thereby elevates the website to the same playing field as television providers such as HBO and Netflix.
All ten episodes of Transparent are available online through Amazon Instant Watch and can be accessed through an Amazon Prime account or a 30-day free trial offered exclusively to college students.
Please note All comments are eligible for publication in The News-Letter.