Alice Maio MacKay’s new film Satranic Panic tells the story of Aria, a trans woman drag queen, and Jay, her non-binary BFF, who set off on a vengeful road trip across Australia to kill demons. If this sounds like Buffy meets Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, that’s because it is.

It’s also a colorful, emotional and campy feat of indie filmmaking by MacKay, a 20-year-old Australian trans woman writer/director, who has already completed half a dozen films. She’s cemented herself as a Gen Z voice of independent trans filmmaking.

I caught up with Alice to chat about her inspirations, her process, and the state of trans indie filmmaking around the world.

Gabe: Hi! What time is it where you are?

Alice: It’s 10:00 AM.

Gabe: What, like the next day? Wednesday?

Alice: Yeah, it’s Wednesday!

Gabe: Wow! Crazy. Okay, I watched Satranic Panic, but I had also seen your other movies like So Vam and T Blockers. I’m thrilled to be talking to you. What is your background? When did you first get into film?

Alice: When I was younger, I was always into writing stories and telling stories using Lego figurines and sets. And then in late primary school I started exploring the world of film with a stop motion app that came with one of my Lego sets. In about fifth or sixth grade I entered one of my animation films in an international youth short film festival. I was a State finalist.

After that I started reaching out to some cool production companies that were filming locally and asked if I could come on set. Although I grew up in a small town there’s quite a lot of filming that happens there. And I was happy to help in any way I could and to watch and learn. So, I was really lucky because I met a bunch of film people on those sets and then they invited me back for more work experience. I just got to meet all these great people – and learn a lot. And then from there I made my first short film or well, proper short film when I was 14. It was through the Stephen King Dollar Baby project. And all the people I had worked with, or did my work experience with, they volunteered to help out making the film, so we did it with no money and then that film did kind of well, and it just went from there.

Gabe: What was the Dollar Baby project? And what did you learn from doing that short that you take with you today?

Alice: The Dollar Baby Project was designed for student filmmakers. Stephen King invited filmmakers to select from a list of his short stories and to apply for the rights to make the short story into a film — for one dollar. I acquired the rights to adapt the Stephen King thriller short story, “A Tale of the Laundry Game.” And I learnt so much from that, it was the first time I’d worked with a professional DOP and cast. Everything from that was so valuable and really helped launch my career.

Gabe: What was the town you were living in where they were shooting stuff?

Alice: I was born and grew up in Adelaide, South Australia, but now I live in Sydney, New South Wales.

Gabe: Do you think that your work is influenced by being Australian?

Alice: There is some ‘Australianism’ in the work, but a lot of the films that influenced me as a filmmaker, that influenced my work are American — or at least not Australian. But I guess in terms of language and stuff, some ‘Australianism’ tends to come through – for example, we use the word ‘cunt’ a lot more casually.

Gabe: Ha! Yeah, we take that word a little bit too seriously, and honestly, we could stand to loosen up about it here. So, are you someone who writes all the time? Do you ever write roles specifically for people you want to work with?

Alice: Yeah, I do write all the time. I feel like it was a bit different with Satranic Panic. We had my usual co-writer, Ben Pahl Robinson, but I also wanted to write with my friend Cassie [Hamilton], who’s also the lead in the film. I always had the idea that she was going to be in it. So that influenced the script a little more compared to Carnage for Christmas and T Blockers where it was just like I had this idea and then I went back and forth with my co-writer, but there was never really anyone in mind to star in either of those films.

Gabe: I want to talk about those collaborations because it’s always a delight to me when I see filmmakers reusing people. It makes me feel like I’m part of the group.

Alice: Yeah! A lot of them I met on other sets when I was really young. For example, the guy who plays the weird demon, Brendan Cooney, at the start of Satranic Panic, I’ve known him since I was 12. I met him on this local TV show back in the day when I was just helping out on set. He agreed to do my very first Stephen King short film and then he’s been in every one of my movies since. A lot of people in my films I met in that way.

Gabe: What sticks out for you as “oh this is a good idea for a film?” Do you see a trope like demons or body snatchers and think “I can make that, but different. I can infuse it with a punk trans sensibility?”

Alice: For T Blockers I really just wanted to showcase a trans woman hanging out and living and dealing with the world. And I really wanted to showcase that friendship with a non-binary person as well, because I just hadn’t seen that in film before. And then for the horror stuff, obviously I wanted the character to deal with dating. Then the whole worm allegory just fit perfectly. I always knew it was going to be a horror film eventually. And then even with Carnage For Christmas, I wanted to make this melodrama throwback to Murder, She Wrote and Nancy Drew. I get inspired to write something and then the horror elements are secondary. So, with Satranic Panic, the very first thing I came up with was just a road trip movie, and then came the idea for a trans drag queen and her best friend killing demons.

Gabe: It’s interesting to hear that the horror elements are kind of secondary. I like that. What is the stuff that was influencing you or that you feel like influenced, let’s say specifically Satranic Panic?

Alice: Very, very early on, I thought Priscilla Queen Of The Desert meets Buffy. And then there’s Robert Rodriguez’s work in terms of visual aesthetics, Machete and his whole era of digital filmmaking.

Gabe: Were you a huge fan of Buffy?

Alice: Mostly the movie, to be honest, rather than the TV show. I mean, I do love the show, but the movie was one of the very first things I watched as a young child, and I just became obsessed with the whole world of pop culture and this girl just being so cunty and slaying and killing demons. Luke Perry as well, and Peewee Herman. The Buffy movie is just an incredible film.

Gabe: For Satranic Panic, I wanted to ask about the reveal of the doctor. That was a part that I really loved and that he had his whole monologue about transness. Can you talk about writing that or coming up with that and why you went that direction?

Alice: I knew that we wanted the doctor to be the villain. And then the whole endocrinologist thing just kind of made sense. I don’t know how to say more without giving too much away. But I feel that monologue, it’s very current. It was just this mix of wanting something that was really campy, and melodramatic, but grounded in current Republican rhetoric and how hypocritical some conservatives can be.

Gabe: It’s interesting to hear that it bleeds over to you guys in Australia because we think of it as so hinged on American politics, and American electoral nonsense. Are you influenced by reading stuff about the US or is it just basically the same in Australia?

Alice: It’s more prominent in the US. It gets more media coverage, but I feel like the level of transphobia and the conservative people are just universal. I mean, London, Australia, they all follow each other in some way.

Gabe: So just to switch gears, your films have insanely good soundtracks. For music, where are you sourcing it and how? And is there a favorite placement that you have?

Alice: For Satranic Panic, there’s one track by Those Who Dream, which is an Australian emo band. The band has a trans drummer, and I thought that was really cool — and of course I’m a big fan of their music. And then Cassie, who’s in the film and co-wrote it, she wrote the big drag finale song. And then my composer Alexander Taylor, who’s incredible, he wrote the score. Music is always a big part of film for me. I had a musical upbringing, and I went to music school. For a film like “Bad Girl Boogey,” it was very emo punk culture. I got to use Teenage Joans. And then for T Blockers, we had the “Dead Men Don’t Rape” cover at the end and then Chop Dicks, which is so cool because I just reached out to her on Instagram and she was like, “Yeah, go for it.”

Gabe: Oh, I didn’t know you had a musical upbringing. What did you study at music school?

Alice: Music has always been an incredibly big part of my life. When I was about three years old my parents took me to see Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Phantom of the Opera live and I loved it! After I saw it, I started recounting the story just by the music. It was about the same time that I started taking piano lessons, which I continued till I was about 16 years of age. I still play piano all the time – it relaxes me. I also learnt guitar and for a very short stint bassoon – which wasn’t my thing. I was also part of a special music program in my high school, which allowed me to study different aspects of music including composing. So, I suppose it’s not surprising that music is such an important part of my films.

Gabe: What is indie film like in Australia? Is there a lot of support from the country itself?

Alice: It’s a little bit ironic. The films I’ve made have done well in the US, and that’s really where most of my money comes from. But then an Australian producer will see that and will be like, “Oh, can you join the writers’ room for this?” And I’m insanely grateful for that, but the support from Australia, from the get-go for my films and actually making the films has never really been there.

I think there is a strong group of indie filmmakers, but not necessarily the financial support for their work. Even other independent filmmakers I know, they raised the finances themselves and are working with no budgets like me. And no one in Australia has been really looking to help or facilitate that work, but then America or Europe picks it up and it does really well there. Then Australia will be like, “Oh, can we get you to work on this?” So, the group of people I work with are super amazing. There’s so many amazing artists here, but I feel like our country doesn’t really appreciate you or facilitate indie filmmaking or really care about it until somewhere else does, if that makes sense.

Gabe: Oh, so that’s kind of been the situation is that it’s done well in other places, and then they’ve been like, “Wait, we should probably claim her?”

Alice: Yeah, that’s pretty much it, which I’m not complaining about, but it’s just like America is the wider audience and I get it, but given that in all the films, it’s mostly Australian actors and stuff, you’d think… but yeah, it’s interesting.

Gabe: I’m significantly older than you, and I’ve had very mainstream success in some places, and I was taught all of these things about making movies that were very Hollywood centric and that were very, well, it has to be this way and it needs to have a big name star, and your manager’s got slick little sunglasses on and blah, blah, blah. And coming out of that in the last couple years and being like, wait, that’s all bullshit and maybe none of it matters. And actually, maybe the fifth or sixth guy who’s like, “I don’t know about these trans movies” is just straight up an idiot.

Do you think that there’s a new upcoming era of people who are queer filmmakers, or trans filmmakers specifically, that are just going to see that that’s not the only path and that’s maybe not even a desirable path?

Alice: Yeah, I think so. I guess I honestly came to that place from being on these other sets. I don’t know if it’s the same in America, I guess a little bit maybe, but a lot of the TV shows and bigger companies that I’ve worked for have often been transphobic.

I worked on this high profile TV show about a trans girl that was nominated for an Emmy nomination here in Australia, but it was the most transphobic vile set. And I didn’t get paid despite the show’s budget. I realized that if this was the state of the Australian industry – people who clearly don’t have my best interests at heart or are not progressive and just want to make money from diversity – I couldn’t and shouldn’t wait for their approval to make a film.

Gabe: Do you see a similar sensibility around other filmmakers that you know or that you work with or that are also your age and queer?

Alice: I don’t know about filmmakers my age. I mean, I have a group chat with Vera Drew and Louise Weard who are both close friends and we’re all trans filmmakers in the indie world. And then I know George Barron and we’re quite close. He made the film “The Blue Rose” and is around my age. He’s also a queer independent filmmaker. So, there’s definitely queer people across the world making independent work.

Gabe: I’m coming off the strike and I don’t know if you guys have SAG or if you have WGA or what the system is over there. Is that something that you guys were participating in or have?

Alice: We didn’t have a strike or anything. We don’t have SAG. There are guilds, but it’s not really as intense as it is in America.

Gabe: Yeah, before the strike, there was this big uptick in queer and trans content, and this big push to mainstream it. It felt like progress, but maybe it was just a capitalist trend. Because coming out of the strike, a lot of queer and trans creatives out here have talked about how that bubble has sort of burst and the executives now say, “We’ve got to make a huge Marvel movie because we’ve got to make money back.” I think now it’ll go back to more of an indie sensibility for queer and trans people that I think would have, and this is my opinion, been better off staying indie the whole time.

Alice: Yeah, I mean, I think hopefully — and it’s not where it is now — but I hope that I’m able to make my work and other people are able to make those kinds of works with that executive money, and the executives just understand that not everything is made for every cis person and that there are audiences that will go and see trans films. You saw that with The People’s Joker. It sold out cinemas all across America. There are audiences for these films. If executives trust the filmmakers to actually execute their vision without interruption or influence.

Gabe: What’s your favorite practical effect that you’ve done?

Alice: I really love something we did in Carnage for Christmas, which was a Viking body, archangel skin ripped from the back and ribs split open. That was really sick. I feel like it’s the nastiest looking thing. It’s an offscreen kill, but the body is pretty fucked.

Gabe: Are you testing out different types of blood and guts? Seeing how it looks in different lights?

Alice: Well, I’m just really lucky. Our make-up artist Adele Shearwin, she worked on Talk To Me and AMC shows, so even despite our limited budget, she was able to just come in and do what we really wanted and execute our vision the best possible way.

Gabe: You have such a distinct style between all of the films that there’s sort of this colorful lighting and this very kind of lived in feel. I was pausing and looking at what’s on [the main character’s] walls or what the clothing is specifically. Is there something that you particularly like about this almost like ‘bisexual lighting?’ I don’t mean to put words in your mouth, but to me it feels very punk.

Alice: Yeah, a thousand percent. I mean, all of my films have been colorful and candy-colored, but I mean, especially in T Blockers, we were kind of using color as another character. And you mentioned ‘bisexual lighting.’ I remember joking to my DOP about ‘trans lighting.’ A lot of her bedroom stuff is pinks and blues, and we wanted that to reflect how a safe space would be drenched in those kind of colors. But then the evil chaser men, there’d be an orange and green and nastier kind of stuff. But yeah, it’s a hundred percent a very conscious decision, and I know not everyone loves that kind of lighting, but me, I’m a big fan of Rob Zombie and I mentioned Robert Rodriguez and stuff like that, and it’s just very ‘poppy,’ very grindhouse, very comic book. I just love that world.

Gabe: I really admire your ability to be like, this is the vision that I want to do. I’m going to do it. Vera is editing Carnage for Christmas, but do you also edit so you can achieve the look you want?

Alice: No. I used to edit when I was younger, but I haven’t edited any of my features and I don’t think I ever will. I mean, A) I really don’t like it. And B) I love working with other people, especially being so hands-on, on set. I like having an editor come in and see the footage, know my inspirations, and then us working together to kind of create something new from that.

Gabe: You seem very collaborative, which I think is also sort of a more community-based queer filmmaker thing. It does remind me of Robert Rodriguez in the way that it was very, the towns that he worked in were almost other characters, like parts of the whole movie.

What are you working on now? Can you say what’s in the pipeline?

Alice: I don’t want to give too much away, but I’m working on another project with Vera Drew, and Cassie, which is just this insane animated horror romcom, and also a more supernatural film which I’ll hopefully have more to share about soon.

Satranic Panic is now available to rent.

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