HBO’s Enigma honours trans women April Ashley and Amanda Lear
April Ashley and Amanda Lear. (Getty/Canva)
A new documentary tells the queer history of April Ashley and Amanda Lear, and the trans-inclusive Parisian nightclub that defined them.
Enigma, an HBO original, follows the lives of Lear, also known as Peki D’Oslo, and Ashley, who both rose to fame performing at the Le Carrousel, a Parisian nightclub known as a safe space for transgender women in the 50s.
The club, which closed its doors in 2016, was frequented by famous stars such as Spanish artist Salvador Dali and French singer Edith Piaf. Ashley and Lear were two of the club’s most-popular performers at the height of its fame.
Ashley was among one of the first trans women to have gender reassignment surgery. Sources at the time – reportedly including Ashley – claimed Lear also had the surgery and was a transgender woman but she has always denied the allegations, calling them “a crazy idea from some journalist”.
The documentary, released on Tuesday (24 June), explores the two stars’ lives after their time at Le Carrousel, following Ashley’s career as a model for Vogue, when she was photographed by the famous David Bailey.
Ashley was outed as trans in 1961, and endured a notoriously public divorce from her husband, British aristocrat Arthur Corbett, in the 70s. A judge declared her legally “male” – a decision which set a legal precedent for the UK’s treatment of trans people for decades to come.
Lear changed her name to Amanda Tap after leaving the club, eventually marrying a British architect in the 60s. She has denied performing with – and even ever knowing – Ashley, who died in 2021 aged 86.
Documentary director Zackary Drucker told NBC News that she chose to showcase the women’s histories because Ashley’s “story shed so much light on Amanda’s”. She described Ashley as a “beacon of not being compromised by a world determined to disempower you”.
Drucker went on to say: “You see the scale of the resistance that April experiences, and the way she’s forever treated as an oddity because of her being so clear about who she was. There’s something fascinating about somebody who’s like: ‘No, I’m just going to be me. I’m going to create who I am from the ground up, and I have no tethers, no allegiance… to historical facts’.”
A trans woman herself, Drucker said the unapologetic expression that Ashley exhibited was “just one of many survival strategies for people like us”.
On the relentless questions regarding her Lear’s identity, Drucker said the performer had a unique “master-class” ability to use it to her favour, even referring to it in her song Fabulous Lover, Love Me with the lyrics: “Surgeon built me so well nobody could tell that I once was somebody else.”
Ashley was appointed MBE in the Birthday Honours List in 2012, for her services to transgender equality.
Enigma is available to stream on HBO Max in the US, and can be seen on Sky Documentaries and NowTV in the UK.
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