April 05--"The Matrix" filmmaker Lilly Wachowski said living in Chicago provides a separation from the Hollywood community, which allowed for some privacy amid her gender transition.
"We have such a weird relationship to the Hollywood community. We're such hermits and, curmudgeonly, we live in Chicago, not only because it's a great city but there's a nice insulation between all of that," Wachowski told The Hollywood Reporter Saturday. Her sister Lana, often her co-director and collaborator, also lives in Chicago and revealed her own transition in 2012. "But everybody that we've worked with that I told were absolutely amazing and fine with (my transition)."
Lilly Wachowski, who grew up on the South Side and has studio space on the North Side, announced her transition in a statement to the Windy City Times last month. She made her first public appearance since the announcement Saturday at the GLAAD Media Awards.
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Wachowski said Netflix, which streams her "Sense8" series, and Warner Bros., which released her 2015 film "Jupiter Ascending," let her skip press appearances so she could transition in private.
"It's hard to speak about the whole community of Hollywood, but I can say the people at Warner Bros. were fabulous and the people at Netflix were extremely gracious and protective," Wachowski said. "Warner Bros. had done it before with my sister and I think they had a clock in their head and they knew it would take six months to a year for me and they backed off."
"Sense8," which is partially filmed in Chicago, won the GLAAD award Saturday for best drama series. Scenes for the second season of the series were filmed on the North Side in January.
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