Trans Actor Marvel Rex — It's 'Beautiful' Playing a Version of Himself in 'House of Abraham'
Transgender performance artist, writer, and actor Marval Rex is juggling so many film, TV, and webseries projects that it can be a little hard to keep track of them all. Many of them fall into the horror genre, and some of his projects are comedy-horror hybrids, that most peculiar of genres.
Horror is, of course, a genre with a special connection to the queer community. What LGTBQ+ person can't identify with Frankenstein's monster when, despite his intelligence and curiosity, he is decried as a monster by the townsfolk and chased with torches and pitchforks? In the case of the work Rex is doing, though, the script is getting flipped: The monsters are cruelty, hunger for power, and sadism — and the heroes are queer.
"There's a movie, 'They/Them,' with Kevin Bacon, where the queer people are like, 'Ooh, this is the real monster,'" Rex notes, adding that he tried out for a role in that film himself. "And 'House of Abraham' is another example," he adds, referencing one of his current projects.
In "House of Abraham," Rex plays Alex, a trans man who has come to a weekend retreat at a posh mansion. Overseeing the weekend is the charismatic Abraham, played by the film's writer, Lukas Hassel. Abraham welcomes his guests with gentleness and exuberance, then explains the way the weekend will work: One by one, his guests will choose the time and method of their own deaths. Their fellow guests will witness and honor the moment, and Abraham himself mark the occasion with a slug of fine scotch. Ritual, fellowship, opulent surroundings... how could leaving this vale of tears be done with more joy and panache?
Watch the trailer to "House of Abraham"
Each guest has his or her reason for signing up for the deluxe sendoff. Some are facing terminal illness; one young guest is about to see his life irrevocably wrecked following a tragic accident and the involvement of the judicial system; another can't face the prospect of living on after the death of her lover. Alex, afflicted with none of those things, is simply fed up.
"There's a backstory that I kind of created for myself where he lost everything, and doesn't see a way forward," Rex reveals. "Now, as a trans person, that's the element that's so complicated. And this movie was shot in 2023 — it was a different landscape in the U.S. for trans people two years ago."
As the weekend progresses, and some of the guests begin to voice doubts, Abraham's confidence and gung-ho attitude never waver. His is an overwhelming force of presence... but could it also be a murderous one?
"Lukas is gay in real life," Rex muses, "and [although] he is not explicitly queer in that movie, you could argue that there's some Queer Gothic happening for him as the villain.
"I said yes to this script because the trans character is not disempowered throughout," Rex goes on to add. "We're often the victims in horror movies. So, to see that shift," he says, is exciting.
Read on to find out what else Marval Rex had to say about comedy, horror, and the queer space in between.
EDGE: You have several projects coming up in the genres of horror and comedy, and a horror-comedy hybrid. What can you say about them?
Marval Rex: I'm in a film called "Unsavory Elements." All I can say is it stars Bai Ling, who is an incredible Chinese crossover star. It takes the horror to the Nth degree, and it takes the comedy to the Nth degree.
I just did a comedy [that] stars Tom Arnold. It is a '70s-inspired sex comedy and a spoof on "Airplane!" It was written by a queer man named Scotty Mullen, who is hilarious. My character is a total Lothario. He's a hot-shot, super-hung '70s tennis player who thinks he's God's gift. He tries to hit on every woman that moves, but I feel like he could be a queer character if they gave him more screen time. I think he'd be, like, "Yeah, we could do a threesome, whatever." It's very interesting, because they didn't cast me as a trans character. It was fun to play a cis male character and lean into the psyche what a hot-shot dude would do in the '70s.
EDGE: You're also in the upcoming horror movie "House of Abraham," where you play a transgender man who has a suicidal wish. Did you have any fears about playing to that trope?
Marval Rex: I have no shame or guilt about it. "House of Abraham" is interesting because it's not the regular suicide trope of, "Oh, I'm sad, and I'm gonna take myself out of the world." We're going to somebody's house to do assisted suicide, which is a whole different thing. I have a friend who has a rare form of Lou Gehrig's, and for the last 10 years she's kind of [debated] on and off: "Should I go to Oregon, where there is assisted suicide?" She's a very rational person who's not having a mental health breakdown.
I know that mental health issues are rampant in the community right now, because I'm in the community, and I see it happening. I have struggled, myself, with suicidality — not in a very intense way, but at certain moments, as a young queer person growing up in Salt Lake City. I didn't [know] if I was going to make it to adulthood. I was able to get into this character because I was like, "I know what it's like; let's play with it and see if we can get out of here." And I'm gonna get a little spiritual with you here: I do feel a strong connection to my ancestors, who are from Catalonia in Spain, where they're like, "We need you here to be a light to people and to love people through art."
EDGE: Horror is a huge genre for queer people, though usually it's been queer people identifying with the monster. Now we're starting to see queer people as the heroes who take on the monsters. Are we having a shift in the way that we think about ourselves?
Marval Rex: There's probably some collective stuff that we're working through around the dark side of patriarchy and people in positions of power becoming the villains. I also think that culture is the way that we can have this discussion. Horror is a great genre for that.
EDGE: You have another horror comedy coming up called "Spookable."
Marval Rex: With "Spookable," we have a short film [as] proof of concept. We have a feature written, which I actually think is my favorite [version of the story], and then we have an eight-episode TV series that's [also] written. [The project is] still in development. It's very much horror comedy, kind of campy horror.
EDGE: How do you take a presumably eight-hour long project and turn it into two hours of feature film?
Marval Rex: It was a behemoth of a task. We have eight episodes where there's a "creature of the episode," kind of like 'Supernatural." [We have] a vampire storyline. We have an episode about evil leprechauns. We have the witch lock episode.
EDGE:: A "witchlock?"
Marval Rex: A warlock and a witch put together. Very trans. When my co-writer, Jonathan Andre Culliton, and I read the feature, we were like, "Oh, this is like if Jordan Peele did '24.' The feature is actually scarier, which makes the comedy moments pop.
EDGE: You've got a web series coming up, too, which sounds a little political — "Assigned Female at Birth, A Web Series about Some Bodies." I love it just for the title.
Marval Rex: It's a fabulous web series that focuses on the perspective of people who are assigned female at birth and have different ways of expressing themselves. It's a nice, diverse illumination of the experiences of people who are often on the margins. It's nice to be in a project where I get to kind of explore that more.
In "House of Abraham," very similarly, I get to play a trans character who's not obviously coded as trans. I look very dude. To play myself, essentially, in "House of Abraham" was beautiful. It was just such a gift to not feel like I have to perform trans the way that I think casting wants me to perform trans. I get to just exist as Alex, my character. It was the same on "Assigned Female at Birth." I got to create a character that was more true to my experience.
"House of Abraham" releases in theaters June 13. "Airplane 2025" is available now on major streaming platforms.
If you are in crisis, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention is available to help. Call or text 988 or text TALK to 741741.
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