With less than a week to go before opening night it’s crunch time for the cast and crew of Neptune Theatre’s Peter Pan in Halifax.

Avery Jean Brennan will be on stage playing Fudge, one of the lost children on Wednesday, and it’s far from her first time on stage. Brennan has been involved in acting since she was a child, and spent much of her youth taking part in programs at Neptune Theatre.

She then attended theatre school and her passion for performing took her to stages across the country. But this performance will be special. It will be Brennan’s first time performing on stage since coming out as a transgender woman.

It will also be the first time a transgender woman to perform on the main stage at Neptune Theatre.

“I feel incredible, I feel surprised, this is something I never thought I’d see happen,” said Brennan, who goes by the pronouns she/her and they/them.

“To be the first means a whole lot to me, and it helps me know that I can show other people that they can do this too.”

But she admits that getting here wasn’t easy.

“I knew that I was transgender, I found out during my first year in theatre school,” she said.

“I spent six years in the closet waiting to come out because I knew coming out would mean I wouldn’t be seen for roles any more, it would mean I wouldn’t get to act anymore, and that’s the only thing I wanted to do.”

And they say that’s exactly what happened. Prior to coming out, they were getting call backs, getting roles and performing on stage, but after coming out that all changed.

“I would submit, saying like hey my pronouns are she/her they/them and I’m a woman, please consider me for this role, and I would never hear back,” said Brennan.

“After I came out all of the auditions went away, I stopped getting called in for things, I stopped being seen for things.”

She said the transition was difficult but her passion for the theatre never wavered and so she threw herself into other work.

She began writing and producing her own musical which debuted at Toronto’s Fringe Festival. The Pansy Craze focuses on the ideas of sexuality and gender identity and the cast and crew were made up entirely of members from the LGBTQ2 community.

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