Interview with Filmmaker Kylie Mungenast

This week, the new queer dystopian short, Peppermint Pixie Dream Girl premieres at the Marilyn Monroe Theater in West Hollywood! To prepare for the film's premiere, we had the pleasure of sitting down with writer, director, producer, and editor Kylie Mungenast to discuss not only the short but the world at large and what it means to be a transgender artist in this current political climate.

Rua: "Welcome Kylie, I want to first of all say congratulations on your film, it is so nice to have you here!"

Mungenast: "Thank you! We're about to have our premiere in West Hollywood. We also just found out that our Midwest premiere is going to be at Chicago Underground Film Festival on September 26th so I'm super stoked for that!"

Rua: "That's amazing, congrats! I want to start by asking you where your inspiration for Peppermint Pixie came from because I was sensing a lot of Fallout influences..."

Mungenast: "It's funny you say that, I'm not much of a gamer but after I sent the script to one of my producers she said the same thing! Her note behind that note was like, you know, because in the first draft we didn't have the radio voice in the diner that talks about the looming apocalypse... and while that's going on, 'watch out, there's fucking transsexuals in your backyard!' That was part of the story thematically and consciously, and then that was just something that we added in the development stages that gave it more depth."

Rua: "Speaking of, we're living in a very dangerous time for trans people in the United States, it seems like every day there's a new bill being passed to push this narrative that trans people are dangerous. So I was wondering if the film is equating the looming Cold War nuclear panic to that of trans people now?

Mungenast: "That was completely the intention and to find this thematic parallel between transvestigation and McCarthyism. Because in the 50's everyone was accused of being a communist and today every trans person is accused of being a domestic terrorist. It's horrifying."

Rua: "I could totally see that, frankly I think you're a genius for that. Since we're talking about trans people in the public eye, I want to hear from you how important it was that your lead role, being. a transgender woman, was played by a real transgender woman? Hollywood has had quite a few issues with that in the past."

Mungenast: "I didn't even think twice about it. Zoey Luna was actually our first choice for the role. It was a complete shot in the dark, I was like 'hey, let's just shoot an email to her agency if she's interested.' In those early stages of working with her, it was really fascinating because we're both trans women, but we express femininity in completely different ways. And we talked about how that manifests into Shirley, who was very self-inserty in the early writing stages for me. I wanted to cast someone who was kind of the opposite of me in a lot of ways to play with that tension. She asked me in one of the early stages of rehearsals, like, 'you know, I'm reading the dialogue, and there's all this stuff about being transvestigated. Do you want me to like butch up or anything?' And I was like 'no no no,' because regardless of beauty standards, the point is that you are a woman at risk. Period. And that character who's an asshole in the diner he's probably the kind of guy who's been watching trans porn his whole life, right? The mister 'I can always tell.' I think a lot of that comes from internalized homophobia that manifests into male violence."

Rua: "I'm actually really glad you brought that up because in the film, Shirley is being bombarded with transphobic insults but in reality, she passes extraordinarily well. For a while I thought that was a casting mistake but it's clear to me now that...that's the point. It's not about who passes for cisgender the most, it's about how no women are safe. Can you tell us anything about your next project you've been working on in San Francisco?"

Mungenast: "Yeah, so Abby (the titular Peppermint Pixie) and I are collaborating on it. We're in pre-production for this short. She's had this idea of, like, a figure skater who falls in love with a rollerblader for a really long time. So I was like, 'this is badass, count me in!' And we just got right to work on it. It's a proof of concept for a feature. We're really interested in the aesthetics of old 1940s skating films, like Sonja Henie movies are a huge inspiration for me and we don't have a lot of things in that style that are queer. It was really fun to shoot on 16mm film which is all in a lab getting developed in Boston right now. My cinematographer, Hannah Sam, she was incredible on that piece. I'm really excited to move into editing and keep developing the feature version."

Rua: "I'm so excited to see that. All of your films seem to have the consistent theme of queer identity and struggle, so I'd love to ask you: what do you hope people get out of your work?"

Mungenast: "When I wrote Peppermint Pixie Dream Girl, I didn't intend to come at it from a preachy perspective. I was in a very raw, vulnerable head space. When I sat down and wrote that film, I'd had a hell of a week and I was pretty fucked up. I sat down and I just had so much pent-up rage that I kind of just needed to let out. I sent it to my producer, Liz and said 'this is either the best thing I've ever written or the worst and I want you to tell me which it is, necause if it's the first one, we're going to film it.' The whole first half of the film is examining the roots of transvestigation and apocalypse but it's also this very flirtatious expression of gender dynamics and sapphic sexuality. When one character who has been used to being perceived from the male gaze notices that a woman is checking her out this time and how she rolls with that, right? I feel like a lot of people expect queer filmmakers to make the good representation and stuff but filmmakers are humans too and sometimes we just want to scream out into the universe."

Rua: "Do you feel a responsibility to portray queer joy in a world where seemingly all queer media is about suffering to some extent?"

Mungenast: "I've got other projects that tie into queer joy. There's a tension between what works intellectually and what works emotionally. For so many years I was too focused on what's working intellectually because I was too scared to engage emotionally with my work because it's fucking terrifying to be vulnerable as an artist. Peppermint Pixie Dream Girl was really the first time I felt like I was able to do that. When I make a film, I'm not usually thinking about, 'is this queer joy?' Is this good representation?' I'm thinking about my being authentic with myself. At the end of the day, even if it's a piece that is harder to watch... it's real, and that in itself is queer joy. I love Louise Weard's Castration Movies which are so bleak and just miserable to sit through... in the best way possible. People come out of those films changed for their whole lives. The conversation is not so much about queer joy, it's more about the queer experience and being able to process that communally with other people."

Rua: "So in a way, being able to express queerness at all on film is an act of queer joy?"

Mungenast: "Yeah, that is the queer joy in my opinion."

Rua: "Are there any other filmmakers you think deserve a shoutout?"

Mungenast: "My longtime collaborator Destiny Greer just released her first feature Jellyfish Season that everyone needs to go check out! It was shot all on 16mm, don't ask how we managed to do that! Destiny is one of my muses. Izzy Daniel is an actor I've worked with frequently, she's working on a feature called Built Different that's about trans women in basketball because these days it seems like you can say anything transphobic if you just add the words 'in sports' at the end. She does incredible work."

Rua: "On that topic, I want to give you the space to talk about this as someone who's lived it. Are there any misconceptions about the trans experience you'd like to dispell?"

Mungenast: "So many. In Peppermint Pixie Dream Girl Shirley's gaze onto Dorothy was very much rooted in this frustration of people misunderstanding trans lesbians in particular. People have this idea that trans lesbians (18:51) are autogynephilic men in dresses who want to prey on women. I used to experience a lot of shame for sexuality. People would say shit like, 'you can't want to date a straight passing femme with big tits, that's a toxic male trait you have to unlearn!' There's so much judgment on sexuality as well, I think because people perceive transgender people as inherently sexual. There is so much stigma when trans people exhibit any sexuality at all. I love exploring sexuality and intimacy and exploitation and where those things have a battle with each other. I think there's so much vivid, beautiful sexual imagery that could just be written off as exploitive because of the stigmas people have against others."

Rua: "I think your film, taking place in such a conservative time does a great job of dispelling the misconception that transgender people are a new phenomenon. This also applies to gay and autistic people because now people write off their struggles as a trend when the reality is that these people have always existed, they just couldn't be their true selves."

Mungenast: "Visually, while my work with the collaboration I do with cinematographers may look and feel like it's from those eras, the material, the dialogue, and the character arts are also so modern in a way. It exists in limbo of its own fantastical world, like a painting almost"

Rua: "Your work reminds me a lot of Anna Biller actually!"

Mungenast: "I love Anna Biller! The Love Witch is a huge inspiration!"

Rua: "I can definitely see that. Do you have any other inspirations?"

Mungenast: "I really love Westerns like The Great Silence by Sergio Corbucci, it... turns the genre into a weapon."

Rua: "So can we expect a trans lesbian Western any time soon?"

Mungenast: "I actually have one in development right now with a sponsorship from Film Independent so hopefully something happens here."

Rua: "That's incredible, I'm so happy for you! I think that's a great note to end on. Best of luck with the premiere on the 21st!"

Mungenast: "Thank you!"

If you are in Los Angeles, make sure to check out the premiere of Peppermint Pixie Dream Girl at the Marilyn Monroe Theater in West Hollywood on August 21st! Thank you to Kylie for appearing on our publication and thank you for tuning into Cinemasters.net. As always, remember to never stop watching!