Some filmmakers find inspiration in the technical craft of the classics, but Siobhan McCarthy found it in what wasn’t shown: transgender stories. Since they dropped out of high school and ran away to Los Angeles at 17 years old, McCarthy has come a long way to find their creative voice.
“Being trans, you don’t have a whole lot of actual role models,” McCarthy told WSN. “There’s not a lot of people in the industry who are older than me who are trans.”
McCarthy started working in the industry as a production assistant, then a cinematographer, eventually writing and directing their own low-budget feature film entirely outside the studio system — they even shot in their producer’s childhood home. Aiming to fill the gaping hole of trans representation, McCarthy made the chaotic, yet poignant comedy film “She’s the He,” which premiered at the South by Southwest Film & TV Festival in March 2025.
The film follows best friends Ethan (Misha Osherovich) and Alex (Nico Carney), whose classmates often mistake them for a couple. In an effort to change the status quo before graduation, they decide to dress up as girls and tell everyone at their high school they are transgender, despite both identifying as male. Along the way, Ethan realizes she’s actually trans, leaving the pair’s friendship on thin ice. As a series of rocky events unfolds through vibrant colors, “She’s the He” laughs at the ridiculousness of gender constructs.
McCarthy spoke to WSN about how they entered the industry, the journey behind finding their comedic style and the intent behind “She’s the He.”
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
WSN: How did you get into filmmaking?
McCarthy: I was a professional ballerina and circus performer until I was 18 years old. I ended up in this fashion film for [the fashion magazine] i-D. The cinematographer happened to have grown up in the same town as me, and while I was standing there unhappy, I asked him what his job was because he looked much happier than I. He told me what a cinematographer was, and I asked him to hire me, so he did as a PA. By working with him, he taught me how filmmaking worked, which was unbelievable for someone from nowhere and a childhood runaway, then getting into the film industry — that does not happen.
WSN: How did you find your comedic voice?
McCarthy: I was never a class clown, I was a very serious child. I happened to find my comedic voice through making fun of conservative people. It is so ridiculous, but so hard to confront the absurdity of the world that is America right now and not meet it with fear or laughter. So much of my comedic voice was just me talking with my friends or writing directly about what was being lobbed at trans people. I found that if I took it head-on and engaged with it sincerely, it was so inherently funny because it’s so inherently absurd.
WSN: What inspired ‘She’s the He?’
McCarthy: ‘She’s the Man’ was a huge movie for me. When I was a kid, I didn’t know why I loved it so much, but that movie spoke to me so intensely. ‘Clueless,’ ‘Easy A’ and ‘Superbad’ too and not just the way that the comedy landed, but the way it never stops. They were the cornerstone of what I was trying to get out of making this film. I just wanted one of those movies that I had grown up with that included what I experienced in high school and what I’ve experienced in my life.
‘Some Like it Hot’ is the quintessential trans movie that’s not a trans movie. That movie is so magnificent in the way that it does the camp of dressing male characters up as girls, and then having everyone accept that they are cisgender women. While it’s not a trans movie, one of the characters decides to stay in this world of being a girl, while the other one is so uncomfortable that he bails. I wanted to try to hit that same point in this movie, but from the perspective of actual transness.
WSN: What’s a message you hope viewers take away from watching ‘She’s the He?’
McCarthy: I definitely made this for trans kids. They are so under the gun now in such an intense and brutal way. Hopefully, I made something that gives them a representation of an absurd version of high school that they can see themselves in or find respite in. The world can be so bleak right now that all I really want to do is bring laughter, joy and a momentary break to anyone who watches it. If I could have created a movie that, for two seconds, they can live in a world where things exist in this heightened fantasy where they can laugh at their bullies, that is enough for me.
“She’s the He” opens at the IFC Center on Friday, June 5. The NYU Program Board will host a screening of the film on Thursday May 7 in the Kimmel Center. RSVP for the event here.
Contact Alessa Alluin at [email protected].