"I was in character as much as humanly possible," Jared Leto proclaimed, discussing how he approached his performance as Rayon, a transgender woman with AIDS who struggles with substance abuse in the new film "Dallas Buyers Club," a role that is bringing him critical raves and Oscar chatter. "I stayed as close to Rayon as I could. There was too much to lose. I couldn't imagine the director calls, 'Action!' and I have to recall all of these things -- from the voice to the dialect to the circumstances and emotional conditions. There was just too much there."


Though Rayon is a fictional character, the film -- set in the '80s -- is based on the true story of Ron Woodruff, played by Matthew McConaughey in an equally heralded performance. He's a heterosexual Texas electrician who learns he has HIV and battles not just the disease but his own rancid homophobia and transphobia. In the film, that's particularly evident after he first meets Rayon, when they share a hospital room. Eventually, they organize a buyers club to bring unapproved treatments for AIDS into the country at a time when the government and pharmaceutical companies are only peddling the toxic AZT.


"When you wax your eyebrows and lose 40 pounds it's hard to escape the physical side of that," Leto said, speaking with me on SiriusXM Progress, about living as Rayon when he wasn't on set. He explained that it gave him a very brief glimpse of the ignorance and outright hate that many transgender people often experience.


Jared Leto On Preparing For The Role Of Rayon:


"There was one day where I had a couple of hours off, which was rare, because we were always shooting -- we shot the film in 25 days, no lighting at all, no rehearsal," Leto said. "I went to Whole Foods and I remember getting three distinct looks. One was, 'Who is that?' The second was, 'What is that?' And the third was, 'I don't know what that is, but I don't like it.' And it was interesting to get that condemnation. Easy for me, because I'm playing a part, but it was important to kind of understand and acknowledge that."


In the film, Rayon is referred to as "he" and "him," and the word "transgender," which was not in common usage at the time, is not used. But Leto described Rayon as someone who lived "as a woman, not as someone who just enjoyed putting on women's clothing." Another actor, he said, might have played Rayon "as a drag queen or a transvestite," but he saw the character differently.


"Someone asked me last night at a screening, 'Why did they refer to her as "him," and not "she?" And I just responded, 'Because it was 1985,'" he explained. "It wasn't a very common term, 'transgender.' But I certainly saw her as someone who, if she was living now, would identify with that term."


Though he'd not made a film in six years, focused on his music career and touring the world with his band, Thirty Seconds to Mars, Leto couldn't turn down the role.


"I read the script after trying to avoid it for a couple of weeks," he recalled. "I fell in love with the role, with Rayon. She's easy to love, full of grace and charm. I thought it was the most amazing opportunity and I couldn't say no."


Researching the part included meeting with transgender people and learning "what it was like to tell your parents, what it was like to transition, what it was like to live your life as you dream it" He studied up on the early years of the AIDS epidemic, too. For that he also drew upon personal experience, having had a roommate who died of the disease.


Leto On His Former Roommate's Inspiration:


"When I first moved to Los Angeles, I rented a room in a three-bedroom house and one of the rooms was rented by a man in his 40s who was dying of AIDS," Leto said. "This was 1991. I watched week after week as he withered away and got sicker and sicker. I remember walking with him to the grocery store and he would get vegetables to put in the blender in an attempt to stay healthy. He was a wonderful person. Very kind and funny and a great sense of levity. A lot like Rayon."


Leto, who's toured Russia with Thirty Seconds to Mars (which released a new album earlier this year, "Love, Lust, Faith + Dreams"), also addressed the controversy over Russia's law banning gay propaganda and the debate about whether artists should boycott the country. Cher refused to perform at the Winter Olympics in Sochi next year because of the Russian law, while Elton John announced he's "got to go" to Russia, saying he could better change minds by performing there.


Leto On Living As Rayon:


"I'm not so sure what the role is for us as entertainers," Leto commented. "I'm not so sure. You can also take advantage of the opportunity to stand on stage and to make a statement to the people that are there, and who want to celebrate and may be affected by the stupid laws in place."



Also on HuffPost:




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  • 1. Defining Transgenderism


    The root of the word "transgender" comes from the Latin word "trans," meaning "across." A trans-Atlantic flight goes across the Atlantic Ocean; a transnational issue affects people all across the country; and so on. "Transgender" literally means "across gender." "Transgender" is defined today as an umbrella term with many different identities existing under it.

    <em>Image via ccharmon on <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/9439733@N02/4922468556/" target="_hplink">Flickr.com</a></em>




  • 2. A Few Words Of Advice


    When trans people reveal their trans identity to someone, it is a highly personal moment. It takes trust and courage to talk about gender identity or gender transition. The best-case scenario is probably to: 1) ask what questions, if any, are appropriate; and 2) give the trans person an out if he or she feels like you are overstepping your bounds (even though your questions may be born of an innocent curiosity). This makes it easier for a trans person to maintain privacy and integrity.




  • 3. The Gender Binary


    The gender binary exists for easy categorization and labeling purposes. For most people, it is something that is taken for granted. Females who identify as women use the women's restroom. Males who identify as men dress in suits and ties or tuxedos for formal events. It is the way it is, and that fits well for many people. But for trans people living in a culture where the gender binary rules all, it is a daily battle.

    <em>Image via kimberlykv on <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/kimberlykv/2681705695/sizes/z/in/photostream/" target="_hplink">Flickr.com</a></em>




  • 4. Gender Expression


    Out of the three terms -- "sex," "gender identity," and "gender expression" -- which do you think we notice most about people on a daily basis? If it were a person's sex, then we would have to see under that person's clothes or test his or her chromosomes (and even then we could get a conflicting report). If it were a person's gender identity, we would have to either ask that person how he or she identifies or somehow get inside the brain and find the answer for ourselves. By process of elimination, you guessed it: it's gender expression.

    <em>Image via MuLaN™ on <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mulan5/1586972480/sizes/z/in/photostream/" target="_hplink">Flickr.com</a></em>




  • 5. Orientation And Gender


    If we look at society as a diverse group of individuals where heterosexuality might be the most common sexual orientation but not necessarily normal, then we can more easily see that human sexual orientation varies: some people happen to be straight, some gay, some bisexual, and so on. This does not necessarily have anything to do with a person's gender identity or expression.




  • 6. Coming Out To Oneself


    Realization that one is trans can take anywhere from a few moments to several decades. Usually, trans people have an inkling early on in their lives that their assigned gender feels out of sync with their bodies. The self-realization process is extremely complicated. The human mind does its best to help us survive, which can translate into triggering intense denial. Because of societal constraints, it is common for a person to try to ignore signs pointing toward transgenderism, whether consciously or unconsciously.




  • 7. Surgeries


    Health insurance covers transgender surgeries in very few cases. Some people have fewer surgeries than they would like because of the high prices. Still other trans people elect not to have surgery at all because they simply do not want to.

    For a long time, and still in many places today, people refer to some transgender surgery as "sex-change" surgery. Later on came the less-harsh sounding "sex-reassignment surgery." Today, more and more people are realizing that surgery for trans people is not a gender "reassignment" but rather an affirmation of the gender that a person has always been. Gender-affirming surgery seems to be the most accurate reflection of this.




  • 8. Hormonal Transition


    For trans women, taking hormones is a two-step process. To help feminize a genetic male, it is very important to suppress production of testosterone. The other step that transgender women frequently take is the administration of estrogen, which is the chief hormone at work in biological females.

    Unlike their male-to-female counterparts, trans men do not have to take any estrogen-suppressing substances as part of their hormone treatments. Testosterone (called simply "T" in the female-to-male community) is a powerful hormone. The raising of testosterone levels in a trans man overpowers existing estrogen levels.




  • 9. Transgender Children


    There can't really be transgender children, can there? Kids can't know for sure how they feel when they're really young, right?

    Wrong. Gender identity is thought to be solidified by age 6. This does not mean that children absolutely, positively know how they identify by that age. It simply means that their gender identity is there. If it doesn't match up with the sex they were assigned at birth, then that will start to manifest itself in different ways.

    <em>Image via libertygrace0 on <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/35168673@N03/3595145967/sizes/z/in/photostream/" target="_hplink">Flickr.com</a></em>




  • 10. Sex, Gender And Nature


    Many plants and animals can be both male and female, biologically speaking, at the same time or at different points in their lives. In a comparison of 34 postmortem human brains, scientists found that the part of the brain comprising a small group of nerve cells thought to pertain to gender and sexuality were similar in trans women and non-trans women. Although the study only had one trans man's brain, it found that group of nerve cells to be similar to that of a non-trans man. Perhaps Dr. Milton Diamond put it best when he said, "Biology loves variation. Biology loves differences. Society hates it."




  • 11. Transgenderism As A Mental Health Issue


    Gender identity disorder (GID) appears in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), which is the American Psychiatric Association's official diagnostic book. GID, soon to be changed to gender dysphoria in the DSM 5, is classified as a mental health condition in which a person desires to be the "opposite" sex of that assigned to him or her at birth. Due to its criteria, many trans people fall under this diagnosis. It is still classified as a mental disorder by virtue of its existence in the DSM.




  • 12. The Bathroom Debacle


    Imagine resigning yourself to not ever using the bathroom in a public place. For trans people, this is often a reality. Those who are in transition or do not pass on the outside as "clearly male" or "clearly female" are thrown out of both men's and women's restrooms on a daily basis. Some places provide "unisex" or "family" restrooms, but the majority do not. If a transperson wants to go out and enjoy a concert, sporting event, or simply a day outside the home, he or she must make concessions that most people never have to think about.




  • 13. Lesser-Known Types Of Transgenderism: Genderqueerism


    People often find the notion of genderqueerism difficult to understand. They may hear that a genderqueer person is in between male and female, or is neither, but they may continue to ask, "OK, so what sex or gender does that make them, really?" This is where it is perhaps most difficult to live as a genderqueer person. The constant explanations that sometimes get nowhere can be frustrating and disheartening for genderqueer people.




  • 14. Transgender By The Numbers


    Unfortunately there is no major consensus on the number of transgender people in the United States or the world today. Hard-and-fast statistics are lacking for a couple of reasons. One is that many trans people are not out and are either living as trans behind closed doors or living stealthily, meaning that people do not know that they were born differently than they appear now. Another reason for the lack of statistics is that so many different varieties of transgenderism fall under the umbrella term that it is hard to discern which subcategories should actually be statistically counted as transgender and which should not.




  • 15. Parting Words


    In America we have seen that teenage suicide because of bullying has reached epidemic proportions. Many of these kids are LGBT, and most of them are taunted due to some component of their gender expression. I hope that you will talk to others about what you have learned about transgenderism. No one should have to suffer because of who he or she is, but we know that reality tells us differently. People have been bullied and persecuted for who they are since the dawn of time. But we are not defenseless. The more education that is out there about what is means to be different, the better.