Elliot Page reveals his estranged dad engages with hate posts about him
Elliot Page hasn’t spoken to his father for five and a half years. (Getty/Bruce Glikas)
Actor and author Elliot Page has revealed that his mother and father had wildly different reactions to him coming out as gay and then trans.
Page came out as gay back in 2014, before revealing via an emotional Instagram post in 2020 that he is a trans man.
In the near three years since, Page, 36, has become one of the world’s most notable trans people, frequently opening up about their gender journey and revelling in the joy of gender-affirming care.
This year, The Umbrella Academy actor has continued sharing small snippets about how transitioning has changed his life for the better – from getting his passport photo updated, from feeling able to walk around shirtless.
“It feels so f**king good soaking in the sun now, I never thought I could experience this, the joy I feel in my body… I am so grateful for what gender-affirming care has allowed me,” he wrote in an Instagram post last month, complete with the hashtag #TransJoy.
Page, who has also been transparent about the gender dysphoria he felt before transitioning, has wrapped all of his life experiences up into his new book, Pageboy: A Memoir.
In the book, he divulges more about his experience of transitioning, and also reflects on the very different relationship he has with his parents.
He writes that he hasn’t spoken to his father Dennis in five-and-a-half years, and probably won’t speak to him again, with Page claiming that his dad engages with “those with massive platforms who have attacked and ridiculed me on a global scale”.
Last year, right-wing author Jordan Peterson was banned from Twitter for making derogatory comments about Page’s transition, branding the doctor who provided Page with gender-affirming surgery a “criminal physician”.
When Twitter allowed Peterson to return, he did so by pathetically deadnaming the actor.
“When Jordan Peterson was let back on Twitter after he’d made a horrific tweet about me, he posted a video, just his head filling the frame,” Elliot Page wrote in his memoir. “Staring menacingly into the camera, he said, ‘We’ll see who cancels who.’ My dad ‘liked’ it.”
Speaking to The Los Angeles Times, Page expanded on his entirely different relationship with his mother Martha, who separated from his father when Page was young.
Initially, when Page came out as gay, his mother wasn’t supportive; as a minister’s daughter, she allegedly told Page that homosexuality didn’t exist. However, in the years since, she has been on a journey Page called “inspiring”, morphing from homophobia to allyship.
“I think it’s really inspiring that she’s changed and become such an advocate and ally… it took her time to break out of the ideas she grew up with,” Page reflected, adding that his mother was relieved when he came out as trans, as she could see him at ease with himself.
In addition to enduring a difficult relationship with his family, Page has also delved into the fractured relationship he has with Hollywood.
While he’s previously explained how he was made to wear dresses during the press for 2007 film Juno, he’s also revealed that a famous actor threatened to rape him when he came out as gay.
“You aren’t gay. That doesn’t exist. You are just afraid of men,” Page recalled the actor telling him. “I’m going to f**k you to make you realise you aren’t gay.”
Pageboy: A Memoir is out now.
