Auckland actress and screenwriter Manu Vaea was 21 when she returned to Aotearoa to collect a prize at the 2019 Prime Minister’s Pacific Youth Awards after a wild holiday in South Korea filled with partying, men and youthful recklessness.
But instead of relishing in the success of being a proud Tongan multidisciplinary artist, Manu was thinking about her body.
Assigned male at birth, the poet and performer, now 26, desperately wanted to transition to female, while embracing celibacy after years of meaningless intimate encounters.
“My body now is the one I was always meant to have, but I was quite reckless with it prior to transitioning because I wasn’t inhabiting it the same way,” says Manu.
“After that crazy trip, I realised it’d taken a bit of a toll on me, so I thought, ‘Maybe just cool it.’ Since my body has undergone all this change, I can’t bear the thought of putting it through the wringer. It’s sacred and really special.”
Manu was 23 when she began hormone treatment and stepped out publicly as fakaleitī. She describes the term as “encompassing both female and male energies”.
The term means “like a lady” in Tonga, where Manu spent time as a child, having grown up between a village called Lapaha and South Auckland.
“For people like me, who were assigned male at birth and identify as feminine or a trans woman, in Tonga we fall under the category of fakaleitī,” explains Onehunga-based Manu. “In essence, it’s part of two sets of gender. For people who are assigned female at birth and are masculine in nature, or trans men, they fall under the category of fakatangata.”
A year before she transitioned, Manu confided in family in Tonga. There, fakaleitī are held in high regard in many villages, and gender and identity are more easily expressed.
“There, the feminine and masculine gender roles are really malleable. You fall in where necessary,” says Manu, whose pronouns are they/them/she. “My family said, ‘You don’t need to do that. Here, you are a girl just as much as a boy. You are a girl and we see you’. It was really lovely.”
The words have stuck with Manu, who had to explain gender is viewed differently in New Zealand.
“I said, ‘You see me, but the world at home doesn’t. The West doesn’t see me and I’m transitioning so I can move the way I need to here.’”
Now, fours years celibate, and “leaps and bounds” happier since transitioning, Manu often uses the experience as creative fuel.
She wrote a commissioned poem for an Auckland Art Gallery publication, called Declaration Of Pacific Feminist Agenda. It explained the grieving Manu’s parents went through around different versions of their daughter.
When the outspoken artist was invited to assist with co-writing the second season of comedy series Not Even, Manu didn’t expect to also land a lead acting role as “sassy” trans female character Pau.
The show follows five 20-something Māori and Pasifika friends. They crash through life in urban Wellington, navigating culture, identity and community.
“I hope audiences feel the chaos of these characters, or see themselves or a messy cousin, or that friend they don’t really like to call any more because they’re always in drama,” says Manu. Their risqué wit is weaved through the six episodes. “Or even our sweeter characters like Liz, who is trying to find her footing in te ao Māori, while not being able to pick up on social cues. It’s really relevant and a lot of people are navigating that type of stuff every day.”
Manu’s character does plenty of self-sabotaging this season, with audiences predicted to both love and loathe her.
“Pua is a terrible person. The great thing about having terrible people on screen is you can see all sides of the picture,” she explains. “Within Pacific TV and film, there’s a lot of wanting to only show the very best. The reality is, we can all be wicked at times. We all have mean and cruel aunts, uncles, cousins and friends. We deserve to have that reflected to us if we’re talking about representation.”
Manu agrees she shares some characteristics with her abrasive character.
“Pua goes about life anticipating hurt and feels understandably guarded,” she says. “It’s common for minorities, in this case a trans woman, to build up an icy exterior for protection.”
But like Manu, who enjoyed filming in Wellington and meeting the city’s “really lovely people”, Pua realises not everyone is out to hurt her.
“Her sassiness is a huge front for all the things she’s micromanaging within herself,” tells Manu. “She’s like a lobster – hard and crusty, but you cut her open and she’s squishy as all hell.”
Not Even is streaming now on Neon.
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