Joey Soloway (creator of TV’s Transparent and I Love Dick) was interviewed by Camp (creator of the Queer Serial LGBTQ history podcast) about how they make work that uplifts and centers people of marginalized genders and identities, how they navigate resistance to change in the entertainment industry, and how their art-making career and activist career inform one another. Soloway’s production company Topple “was founded on the belief that women, people of color, queer people and their allies can use the power of story and voice to change the world.”

Soloway, a Chicago native, is an award-winning writer, director, and producer and LGBTQ activist with numerous significant accomplishments in the fields of television, film, and publishing. Soloway is the creator of the groundbreaking Amazon original series Transparent, a poignant comedy that artfully explored identity, love, sex, god, and boundaries through the lives of a complicated American family. The series, which debuted in 2014 and ran for five seasons, revolved around a Los Angeles family and their lives following the discovery that their parent is trans. Over the course of its five-season run, Transparent received 24 Emmy nominations and eight Emmy awards — including two for Solowayʼs directing – as well as two Golden Globes. When Transparent won the 2015 Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series–Musical or Comedy, it became the first show produced by a streaming media service to win a Golden Globe for Best Series, as well as the first show produced by Amazon Studios to win a major award. Soloway launched their arts career in Chicago’s Off-Loop theatre movement in the 1990s with Chicago’s cutting-edge Annoyance Theatre comedy troupe, which produced the underground hit The Real Live Brady Bunch, in which episodes of the 1970s sitcom The Brady Bunch were re-enacted onstage in a tongue-in-cheek deadpan style by a cast that included up-and-coming Jane Lynch HDR ’16, later recipient of an Honorary Doctorate from Columbia College Chicago. After premiering at the Annoyance Theater, the show, under the direction of Joey Soloway and their sibling, musician Faith Soloway, had successful runs Off-Broadway and in Los Angeles. After moving to Los Angeles in 1996, Joey Soloway became a writer and executive producer on the HBO series Six Feet Under from 2002-2005. They also co-created the 2016-2017 Amazon series I Love Dick, an exploration of art, desire and power. Other TV producing, writing, and/or directing credits include the series Grey’s Anatomy, United States of Tara, How to Make It in America, Looking and the 2015 documentary miniseries This Is Me, which features trans people telling their own personal stories. Soloway also wrote and directed the feature film Afternoon Delight, which premiered at the 2013 Sundance Film Festival, where it earned Soloway the Directing Award (United States, Drama).

Devlyn Camp is the producer, writer, and host of Queer Serial, a three-season podcast chronicling LGBTQ+ liberation in America from the beginning to the Stonewall Rebellion and its aftermath (1924-1970). Producing the first season of Queer Serial earned Camp a place on Windy City Times‘ “30 Under 30” list in 2018 and recognition in the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Reader, and other publications. Camp received a 2021 Excellence in Journalism Award from NLGJA: The Association of LGBTQ Journalists for their contribution to the “Queer Spaces Project” published by the online publication them.us memorializing LGBTQ+ spaces that have shut down during the COVID-19 pandemic. Camp was also a 2021 GLAAD Award nominee for Outstanding Journalism for the “Queer Spaces Project.”

Camp has presented Queer Serial in a three-night series at the GLBT Historical Society in San Francisco. Camp also produces the podcast On the Mic: OutSpoken LGBTQ Storytelling for one of Chicago’s oldest gay bars, Sidetrack. They have also reported on queer topics and literature for the Chicago Reader, were a contributing historian for the Chicago Tribune and the Chicago Sun-Times, and co-hosted and produced They & Them, a queer news podcast in Chicago. They are currently directing a documentary about the last living Mattachine gay activist, Randy Wicker.