Tangerine: Transgender actresses set for pioneering Oscars campaign

Producers hope the comedy drama can follow Laverne Cox's groundbreaking Emmys win and triumph next year

Kitana Kiki Rodriguez and Mya Taylor star as prostitutes in Tangerine (Rex Features)

Two rising stars could be the first transgender actresses to take home acting gongs at next year’s Oscars, thanks to Sundance hit Tangerine and the backing of Hollywood hotshots.

Kitana Kiki Rodriguez and Mya Taylor will be the subjects of a groundbreaking Oscars campaign mounted by distributors Magnolia Pictures and producers the Duplass Brothers, who hope to bring the trans movement to Academy voters.

Rodriguez and Taylor play prostitutes in Sean Baker’s comedy drama, which follows a trans woman on a Christmas Eve hunt around Los Angeles for the Hollywood pimp who left her heartbroken. It was shot almost entirely on an iPhone 5S to keep the budget down.

The poster for Sean Baker's Tangerine

Taylor was thrilled to be cast in Tangerine, telling the New York Times that she was “very happy about what’s going on with transgender people coming out into the screen, because it’s unheard of”.

In the television world, Laverne Cox became the first trans actress to win an Emmy for her performance as prisoner Sophia Burset in hit Netflix series Orange is the New Black. Oscar-bait films, meanwhile, are predominantly led by white, cisgender, straight actors.

Mark Duplass told Variety: “One thing that has become apparent to us as we look at this stuff, is that the TV Academy has embraced what’s happening in the trans movement with Transparent and Orange is the New Black. The film Academy is a little behind on that front.”

Hollywood often comes under fire for casting cis actors in trans roles, most recently with Eddie Redmayne playing artist Lili Elbe, one of the first people to undergo gender reassigment surgery, in The Danish Girl.

Tangerine’s campaign will consist of “tastemaker” screenings in LA and New York, with screeners sent to those voting in the acting, cinematography and screenwriting categories.

Tangerine arrives in UK cinemas on 13 November.