Nick Dumont, star of Oppenheimer, has opened up about their coming-out journey after announcing that they are trans masculine and non-binary.
The actor, who clarified that they now use they/them pronouns, said: ‘Coming out to myself as trans has been one of the longest challenges I’ve faced in life. It has also been the most rewarding by a mile.’
Dumont went on to describe how they came to understand their gender gradually over the years.
‘I lived in an authoritarian household for many decades where it wasn’t safe to be myself at home. I knew at 13/14 I wasn’t ‘like other girls,’ I knew I liked girls and I knew I didn’t feel right in my body,’ they continued.
The screen star described a moment of gender euphoria they experienced around a decade earlier when they played a trans character.
‘Around 19, I was cast as an [assigned female at birth] trans teenager in a TV pilot,’ they explained. ‘I looked at myself in my trailer in basketball shorts, bandage wrapped around my chest and I thought, “Damn I look good!”
‘I’m trans. I love being trans. We’re here. We’ve always been here.’
‘A decade later, I found a safe community, figured out I was nonbinary,’ they continued. ‘Now I’m out, have a life I could have only dreamed of as a kid, and I still get to play women at work.’
Dumont proudly declared: ‘I’m trans. I love being trans. We’re here. We’ve always been here.’
They added that they were ‘grateful’ to live in the present and to have access to ‘safe spaces and support’ and to be able to ‘go to the LA LGBT Centre and get medical care without fear.’
‘That hasn’t been the experience many have had,’ Dumont noted, before sharing their ‘gratitude’ for the ‘courageous queer people’ who came before them.
They concluded by revealing that they had originally planned to take more time before sharing their gender identity with the world.
‘I didn’t think I’d be out to everyone so soon but I made a promise to myself that if someone asked, I would share,’ they said. ‘Someone did ask and I shared…because I’m proud.’
Dumont shared that they would continue using their birth name, Emma Dumont, for work projects, but they plan to go by Nick Dumont in their personal life.