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Jordan Gray

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This article is about the comedian and singer. For other people with this name, see Jordan Gray (disambiguation).

Jordan Redford Gossamer Gray (born 11 January 1989) is a comedian and singer from Essex. She was a semi-finalist on The Voice UK in 2016 under the name Tall Dark Friend, after which she released a single, Platinum, which charted at #114 on the UK Singles Chart. She was nominated for an Edinburgh Comedy Award in 2022 for her tour, Is It a Bird?.

Early life

Gray was born Jordan Redford Gray in Thurrock[1] on 11 January 1989,[2] and attended Hassenbrook Academy in Corringham before spending two years at Palmer's College.[3] Her father was a director of a steel factory who also performed as an Elvis Presley impersonator, while her mother worked as a hairdresser, a bouncer and a pub landlady.[1] Jordan realised she was transgender while chopping wood in Sweden, and came out while accepting a trophy for best original artist at the Essex Entertainment awards while dressed as a cat.[4] Her second middle name, Gossamer, was added due to the UK not having a process to just change honorific from Mr to Miss, and is the scientific name for spider silk;[5] she had considered changing it to Olivia before realising that Jordan was gender neutral and that it was not worth wasting her money.[6] At the time of her appearance on The Voice UK, she was living in Honest Toun.[7]

Career

Initially, Gray was a singer — her first gigs were at her mother's pub as part of death metal band Silent Feedback[1] — and gigged around Essex and London for ten years,[8] the first eight years of which as Jordan Redford Gray,[9] her then full name. She released an album, Pop Psychology, in 2012, and a second album, The Baffled King, in 2015.[9] Gray, under the name Tall Dark Friend, became The Voice UK's first transgender contestant in 2016,[4] and became part of Paloma Faith's team, after JJ Soulx withdrew for personal reasons, and ultimately reached the semi-finals.[10] She then signed to The Record Label[11] and released a single, Platinum, which charted at #114 on the UK Singles Chart;[1] she told Gay Star News that its music video, which featured porn star Mickey Taylor, contained "the first cis male-trans female love scene in a mainstream release".[12] She decided to become a comedian after being dropped by her record label, having performed a skit between performances on one of the live shows on The Voice UK, and having found it more fun than singing; every three days for three months afterwards, she sat in the front row at Top Secret Comedy Club in London and made notes about structure and storytelling. She performed her first gig at The Bill Murray and in a dressing gown and surgical bandages, as she had just had breast implants installed.[1] She announced her change of career on 1 April 2017, and performed her tour People Change at the Edinburgh Fringe in 2018.[13] She won the Best New Comedian award at the Panic Awards in 2019.[14]

In 2020, she appeared in Transaction, a six-part series of five-minute shorts for Comedy Central starring Gray as Liv, a narcissistic transgender supermarket worker.[6] She told Gay Star News she wrote it as an attempt to write "a regular tit-for-brains, not some tragic hero", on the grounds that she "was getting bored of seeing [trans women] represented as either poor suffering saints or hypersexualised villains".[15] ITV later ordered a series of full length episodes.[16] She was nominated for an Edinburgh Comedy Award in 2022 for her tour, Is It a Bird?.[17]

She appeared on Friday Night Live in 2022,[18] and attracted attention for stripping naked during her performance;[19] while some praised her for highlighting the existence of transgender people,[20] some complained of double standards following the perceived cancellation of Jerry Sadowitz for indecent exposure,[21] and others called for her arrest.[22]

Personal life

Gray is married to Heli, a croupier from the Czech Republic, who she met in 2015.[1] She said in 2016 that she would be unlikely to undergo gender reassignment surgery, on the grounds that "as far as I can see it will not affect my life. I have a girlfriend who’s happy with the state of my physicality. I don’t have sexual interactions with my genitals. They don’t interfere with my everyday life as a woman".[23] As a teenager, she suffered from Persisting Perception Disorder.[23] She is completely blind in her left eye.[24]

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f "Jordan Gray: 'It's OK to joke about trans people — we do about everybody else'". The Times. Retrieved 21 October 2022.
  2. ^ Gray, Jordan (11 January 2019). "Wow, I can't believe I'm a 30 year old woman today... and neither can a million+ Daily Mail readers. #HappyBirthdayToMe 🎂". Twitter. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
  3. ^ "Festival was best yet, says Tall Dark Friend". Maldon & Burnham Standard. 8 June 2012. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  4. ^ a b "'I'm literally an X-Man' – is trans comic Jordan Gray the next stage of human evolution?". The Guardian. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  5. ^ "Weird Dreams and Psychic Hangovers". Unicorn Zine. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  6. ^ a b "COMEDY: Jordan Gray stars in online miniseries Transaction". Diva Magazine. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  7. ^ "Transgender Musselburgh singer Jordan Gray auditions for the Voice this weekend". East Lothian Courier. 11 February 2016. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  8. ^ "Rising star Jordan Gray to appear on BBC's the Voice - and she's tipped to win". Thurrock Gazette. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  9. ^ a b "Jordan Gray Releases Debut Single for "Platinum"". Transgender Universe. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  10. ^ "Paloma Faith promises 'trump card' as JJ Soulx leaves The Voice". BBC. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
  11. ^ "Interview With Jordan Gray - Platinum". Idea13. Retrieved 25 October 2022.
  12. ^ "Transgender The Voice star Jordan Gray makes history with new single". Attitude. Retrieved 25 October 2022.
  13. ^ "Jordan Gray: People Change". Chortle. Retrieved 25 October 2022.
  14. ^ "Everything you need to know about Southend Pride taking place this weekend". Essex Live. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  15. ^ "Singer turned comic Jordan Gray: 'I'm sick of people telling me how to be trans'". Gay Star News. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  16. ^ "Jordan Gray gets ITV sitcom and Radio 4 series". British Comedy Guide. 4 August 2022. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  17. ^ "Edinburgh Comedy Awards: Full list of nominees". The Independent. 24 August 2022. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  18. ^ "Friday Night Live, review: at last - unfiltered, opinionated comedy is back on our TV screens". The Daily Telegraph. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  19. ^ "Jordan Gray: Trans comedian strips naked on Channel 4 for Friday Night Live revival". The Independent. 22 October 2022. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  20. ^ "Friday Night Live viewers blown away by comedian Jordan Gray's powerful message". Digital Spy. 21 October 2022. Retrieved 23 October 2022.
  21. ^ "Sexist comedy is back". Spiked. Retrieved 25 October 2022.
  22. ^ "Trans comedian Jordan Gray receives wave of support after absurd calls for her arrest". PinkNews. Retrieved 25 October 2022.
  23. ^ a b Guiltenane, Christian. "The Voice's Jordan Gray: 'I felt this sense of exclusion, that I didn't fit in anywhere. Now I am finally happy!'". Guyslikeu.com. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
  24. ^ "My Festival: Jordan Gray". The Scotsman. Retrieved 24 October 2022.
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