Photograph via YouTube

Star of stage and screen, tireless supporter of the LGBTQ community and various charities, marathon runner, political activist, Izzard is an English stand-up comic, actor , and writer who defines himself as transgender, he cross-dresses, and he identifies as straight. He claims to be: “A complete boy plus half girl”. He has expressed a belief that being transgender is a matter of genetics and that someday this will be scientifically proven, having gone so far as to have his own genome sequenced.

Izzard:

“I’m a lesbian trapped in a man’s body.”

Izzard has been performing since the 1980s, delivering extended monologues on stage such as Glorious, Dress To Kill and Sexie. He has also appeared in films such as Velvet Goldmine (1998), Valkyrie (2008), Ocean’s Twelve and Ocean’s Thirteen (2004, 2007), The Avengers (the 1998 spoof of the 1960s camp series one, not the superheroes) and as Charlie Chaplin in The Cat’s Meow (2001).

Izzard has run 43 marathons in 51 days (with no previous experience, just like that) for the charity organization Sport Relief.

Izzard:

“Hitler had a ‘moderate’ phase. He pretended he was a cool guy. There are pictures of him in a meeting with the first cabinet, offering a chair to someone and holding the door when coming in. But then some things happened and he entered a radical phase. Bush Jr. also pretended he was a good guy until September 11th, and after that we entered a new destructive phase. Brexit and Trump are two very bad news, in any case.”

Izzard can currently be seen on screen as Edward VII in Victoria & Abdul opposite Judi Dench.