Jordan Gray on trans TV ‘milestones’ as her new comedy show Transaction arrives at ITV (EXCLUSIVE)
“We are a storytelling species – it's as necessary to us as reproduction and we need it," Jordan tells Attitude in a new interview
From Heartstopper to The L Word, to the more recent explosion of queer romance in the I Kissed A Boy/Girl franchise, queerness is often seen on screen in ways that pluck at the heartstrings and tear ducts in equal measure. But what’s often missing is the grit – the tongue-in-cheek comedy that often only LGBTQ+ people can nail, and Jordan Gray is the perfect candidate to show us the comedic potential that trans people have in spades.
From her BAFTA award-winning strip on live TV to her sold-out global hit show ‘Is It A Bird?’ Gray is back on both stage and screen to bring audiences along with her to experience her unique blend of self-flagellation and adoration. Transaction, her new six-part comedy and Is That A Cock In Your Pocket Or Are You Just Here To Kill Me? is here to get stuck between our teeth (in the best way possible).
Sitting down with Gray to chat about Transaction, her debut comedy series coming to ITVX later this month, feels like a moment of reflection for the comedian. Created by Gray and starring Nick Frost, Doon Mackichan, Thomas Gray and Francesca Mills, it follows self proclaimed egomaniac Liv who, after realising she’s a clunky diversity hire, knows that she can do whatever she likes at the supermarket she now works at. Why? Because there’s nothing worse than firing a trans woman with a big mouth, and even bigger hair – especially when they’ve already been ‘cancelled’ by local trans activists.
The series provides a layer of comedy that is often not seen on British screens, with Gray’s wit and delicate puns woven into every scene, poking and prodding at her lived experience as a trans woman that intelligently doesn’t shy away from making her the centre of the joke.
It’s a process she cherishes and sees as unique to comedy itself, citing how to be a comedian is to be a storyteller at your core. “We are a storytelling species. It’s as necessary to us as reproduction and we need it. It’s how our brains are built, telling stories.”
After baring all after a performance on Channel 4’s Friday Night Live in 2022, she was subject to a smorgasbord of death threats, public scrutiny and disapproval, despite the moment itself resulting in a BAFTA in 2023. But it’s this public discourse and constant questioning that trans people face that she sees as something able to be quashed (or at least diffused) with comedy, as seen so astutely in Transaction. “We crave information, especially when we’re not sure what’s going on, and we crave information in a way that is not telling us off … so I think it’s natural that people gravitate towards comedians for their news. We’re desperate to fill that nuance with someone with confidence, so I think that’s why comedians have such a unique point of view.”
It’s not just the stage where Gray is making memories. After a sold-out run of her hit show Jordan Gray: Is It A Bird? sent her around the globe performing to sold-out crowds, including at the legendary London Palladium, she returned to Soho Theatre in June to debut her tricky ‘second album’, Is That A Cock In Your Pocket Or Are You Just Here To Kill Me? Using comedy again to poke fun at the way the world reacted to her rocket into stardom, the show navigated what it’s like to be lauded in LGBTQ+ circles, as well as villainised by others – with a nuance hard to pull off.
Ahead of the show’s run at Assembly George Square Gardens at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe Festival, she reflected on what drew her to want to showcase her experience post Friday Night Live in the show, as well as what she’d love to see in the future of entertainment for trans folks. “I use being transgender as a jumping off point to pop that tension for people. I would like to see a world where those prefixes of trans don’t mean anything in the future. Let’s have a transgender presenter of Bake Off? It’s fun that it’s a talking point right now, basically because there’s so few of us. I’d like to find a point where those milestones will have been reached.”
Many comedians often exclaim that ‘you can’t joke about anything nowadays’, but Gray and her blossoming portfolio of work show how fallible male comedians can be, and how narrow that avenue of comedy is. Both through the chaos and charm of Liv in Transaction, and her own personal tales of stardom, transphobia and marriage in Is That A Cock? Gray proves that bringing yourself into the joke doesn’t have to just be self-deprecating for the sake of it. Comedy isn’t binary – and she proves just that. Her work helps us to learn about another person’s world in a way that uses comedy as the Trojan horse, allowing us to laugh with, and not at.
Each episode of Transaction provides a portal into the unique world she has created on screen, not just to show us what it’s like to be a trans woman, but to let us into the multifaceted and stupidly funny reality of the wider world we all live in. Of searching for purpose, or struggling to get a job, or knowing that you’re different but embracing those traits rather than using them as armour. Gray proves that trans people can, and always will be, brimming with creative talent that deserves to have the space and time to flourish exponentially.
Transaction airs on ITV2 from 24 June and is available to watch in full on ITVX.
Is That A Cock In Your Pocket Or Are You Just Here To Kill Me? is on at the 2025 Edinburgh Fringe Festival from 30 July–24 August 2025 at Assembly George Square Gardens.