Olly Alexander and Glyn Fussell’s starry, Live Aid-inspired shindig – featuring Christine and the Queens, Kae Tempest and Munroe Bergdorf – is a show of unity in a dark time for trans people
‘W
e wanted to put on something as big as possible,” says the musician and actor Olly Alexander. He’s talking about Trans Mission, a night of solidarity with the transgender community that he’s put together with Mighty Hoopla director Glyn Fussell in aid of the Good Law Project and the charity Not a Phase. The jam-packed Wembley Arena bill includes Christine and the Queens, Sugababes, Romy and Wolf Alice.
For Alexander, Trans Mission is about “celebration, joy, unity”. For Christine and the Queens, it will be “a place of collective empathy”. For Not a Phase founder Dani St James, “it’s basically a super sped-up Royal Variety Performance, but with me and Olly double-kissing them and not Charles shaking their hands”.
The concert was born out of a moment of dismay for the organisers. On 16 April last year, the UK supreme court ruled that “sex” in the Equality Act 2010 refers solely to biological sex, creating shock and uncertainty in the trans community. The government has yet to approve or reject guidelines by the Equality and Human Rights Commission that could exclude trans people from spaces such as public toilets, but trans women and girls have already been forced out of institutions like the Women’s Institute and the Guides.
