Zach Barack Talks ‘Dead End’ and Bringing Trans Leads to the Forefront

In 2019, Zach Barack made Hollywood history by being the first openly trans actor to appear in a Marvel movie, Spider-Man: Far from Home. Now, he is starring as Barney in Netflix’s new comedy horror, Dead End: Paranormal Park.

Created by Hamish Steele and based on his wildly popular graphic novels DeadEndia, the series follows Barney, a queer trans teenager who escapes his difficult home life by throwing himself into his new job at Phoenix Parks, a Dollywood-type amusement park themed around fictional film star Pauline Phoenix. When he and his new friend/fellow newbie Norma (Kody Kavitha) discover that the park might be a portal to hell, they are thrust into adventures full of ghosts, demons, magic, and chaos.

Barack took some time to talk more about Dead End with OFM, as well as making a monumental first with Spider-Man and passionately using his voice and platform to advocate for LGBTQ inclusivity.

Let’s begin by talking about Dead End: Paranormal Park. What makes the show worth checking out?

Because a show like this has never existed before, and it’s amazing to see a cartoon with a trans lead. I’m biased, but even if I wasn’t playing this role, I’d want people to tune in. We need more shows like this on network streaming services, but unfortunately, it’s really hard to fight an algorithm. It feels like this void we’re all screaming into. Like, watch this thing! Who knows if it will matter, but it’s important.

Like I said, I’m incredibly biased, and I think the show is brilliant. It’s just loads of fun, and I was completely blown away by the writers, animators, and directors. It’s given me a huge appreciation for the amount of hands that touch an animated project and the amount of work that goes into the writing.

You star as Barney, who is a trans youth. How meaningful was it to play this character?

Huge! It’s funny because a lot of people ask if he’s based on me, which is so goofy because this is a web cartoon that’s existed since 2014. I didn’t come out until later. I think people ask that because he’s quite a relatable character, and that’s important. I don’t want to play some alien kid who doesn’t know how to talk (laughs). Unfortunately, a lot of trans roles that get written are kind of like that because the folks who are writing them don’t have that insight. This was unique because it felt very human.

I did an interview with Hamish, and he said something that never occurred to me, which was that Barney is a straight man. We kind of laughed because, obviously, he’s not straight. But he is, for all intents and purposes, the audience surrogate. He’s the character you’re relating to, and I think it’s so unique to have that be the trans person because that’s not normally how it is.

We’re consistently working for queer characters to be humanized. In addition to giving Barney a story that is educational to folks who might have trans people in their lives, educational in a subtle and not handed way where Barney is still multifaceted, I think it was very clever for him to be the audience surrogate as well. What better way to remind everybody we’re human than to do that?

Ultimately, what do you hope viewers take away from Dead End: Paranormal Park?

I just want people to like it because it’s that good! When I was reading the comics, I was super in awe of Hamish, and they’re not identical by any means, but he’s brilliant because he’s writing about class and the way history is written by the victors in such a unique way. Using angels and demons, and that kind of mythology and lore has been in genre fictions for so long but doing it in a way where you’re kind of drenching it in queerness and talking about the ways the world is so complex. I thought that was great.

Although this is a comedy, it also has a ton of horror elements. Why do you think LGBTQ people resonate with the horror genre so much?

Oh! I’ve seen a million videos of people talking about this, so I’m kind of cheating (laughs). So, we talk about Sleepaway Camp often because it’s this complex story where the bad guy is supposed to be a young trans character and there’s gender stuff going on. That character was kind of heroic to some people because if I’m not mistaken, they murdered another character who was quite evil and gross.

My point is, I think there’s camp in horror, and there’s sometimes exaggeration and complexity as to who’s good and bad. So many of these movies were like, STDS are bad, so how do we show that? Let’s have the slutty character die first. There were always dynamics in that. I also think there’s something kind of alluring and transgressive about sometimes rooting for the bad guy

There’s that kind of campiness, but then it is also a genre that sometimes attempts to do discourse in a really barbaric way where it’s like, sex equals bad, or it can be done in a very clever way, like the new Jordan Peele or Ari Aster wave of horror. That’s not to say that old horror doesn’t have important discourse.

I just think it’s always been a place where we’ve been talking, and I think that queer people are always having to highly educate themselves on themselves. It makes a lot of sense that a genre, which is kind of steeped in ‘what does this all mean’ and ‘why is needless bad happening in this space,’ really makes sense to a culture that is often wondering that about their experience.

What is your favorite horror movie?

Oh, my goodness. The Evil Dead, not the first one but the one that’s essentially a remake, is incredible, and from a standpoint of what I love to be spooked by, I really, really, like Bill Skarsgård’s Pennywise. I also think Ari Aster is brilliant. When I saw Hereditary, I said this to my roommate, I love watching a movie that captures a feeling I don’t know how to articulate. Ari is brilliant at that, and not to be basic, but Get Out and Us were incredible as well. I like seeing stuff that’s exciting and hasn’t been done before.

Have you always had a passion and desire to pursue a career in entertainment?

Yes and no. When I was really little, I wanted to go to space, and then my mom told me that you have to be able to survive without vomiting. I was like, well, that’s out (laughs). I guess no space for me, but I’ve always loved having all eyes on me. When I was in fifth or sixth grade, I started to notice that getting in trouble was kind of fun because you got a lot of attention. Then at some point, an adult said to me, ‘you know, positive attention rewards you in the same way.’ I was like, oh! So, I started doing theater.

I thought it was quite nurturing to have a place where you did get feedback immediately. On the stage, you immediately get feedback, and I think that was very important. For kids who might struggle with self-assurance or whatever generational stuff you inherit, I believe it’s important to know that you can immediately be said, ‘good job.’ Theater is very important for building self-esteem, even if you’re not on stage.

If you’re in tech or whatever, you immediately get gratified by the success of doing something tangible like that, and that’s wonderful. That shaped me, and it was great to know that I had adults in my life in that particular regard, who really did take a vested interest in me. I loved being like, everybody, look at me do my schtick. Making people laugh was the coolest thing in the world, and that drew me to the power of comedy.

How are you going to continue to use your voice and platform to advocate for LGBTQ inclusivity?

Without getting too much into it, right now more than ever, we’re seeing the theater and tactics of political violence. Distracting and dividing by villainizing a group. Like, what does everybody care about? For a while it was the bathroom thing, but what do a lot of people in the States care about now? Sports? Okay, so this is where we’re going to put the focus on, and then we’ll use that as a way to then pass, or attempt to pass, hundreds of anti-trans legislation. I don’t know if there’ll be a day in my lifetime where we’re not dealing with this, and it freaks me out.

I don’t let myself sit with it too much, not out of avoidance, but I don’t know if it’s healthy to sit with it for too long. I don’t know if a person can and should do that in its entirety, and I don’t know if there’s anybody well-adjusted enough to handle that. It’s scary, but it motivates me. I don’t know if I’m the perfect spokesperson, or if I can do it. I had someone once say, ‘the whole thing you do is build a stage and hand the mic over.’ I’m still learning what that looks like. I think my biggest impetus or motivation for wanting to have a bigger platform is that people need to know about this thing.

Just one person with a lot of people can tell other people. We need to get a lot of people to listen to us, and I hope to develop a space to do that. And then on a lighter note, tying it back to Dead End, seeing how effective it is to have the main character be the straight trans man, the character that’s relatable, be an effective way to humanize us. That’s another way how I want to be a voice. I want to produce, write, and act in things that are effective devices for teaching people about us without being like, shut up and listen. Even though I want to say that quite often.

One of the biggest barriers you have broken during your career in being Marvel’s first openly transgender actor. How significant is that, and what did you take away from that experience?

It’s always a complex one for me. Not because it’s bad, but because when it happened, people kept asking, what is the character’s experience mean about queerness? I was like, man, I don’t know. He’s just in the class and it’s not that big of a role (laughs). It’s not something I’m ungrateful for. It was my first role, and for most people, that is what that looks like. It’s a little part with a few lines, but if you’re stupid fucking lucky, it’s in a Marvel movie. That was fucking incredible. It taught me so much about movies, and I wouldn’t have changed it for the world.

Suddenly, you’re talking about how it’s this big thing, and you feel kind of dumb. I feel like a fraud. I’m telling people how important it is that I said ‘November’ and one other line in a Marvel movie, but it is. I got loads of messages being like, hey, that was really cool. It did make me a little sad because we should already have bigger things. It’s complex. You’re going to be a little resentful being like, I’m going to talk about how important this was, and I didn’t even get to do anything. That’s not true because I got to do loads, but that’s how it feels.

Like I said, it’s just imposter syndrome. The gig of being an actor is paying your dues, but it taught me how genuinely starved and eager folks are for that representation. On some level, we’re kind of willing to accept crumbs, which is a bummer, but it was also beautiful to see the effect that had on folks. For all the complex feelings about it, I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to do any other thing in my career if it weren’t for that. That broke me in, and that allowed me to my TEDx, my TED Talk, and I believe that’s how Hamish found out about me. It begat other things, and I’ll never stop being grateful.

What are some future goals you hope to achieve with your career?

I would love to have a production company where we make queer stuff, and that doesn’t even necessarily always mean stories about queer people. Just genre fiction that is very queer. We talked about horror and stuff related to the queer experience. I’ve met so many amazing actors in the spaces they’ve been in, who I’m just like, God, I really hope I get an opportunity to put you in something. That’s crazy to think about when you’re like, God, I hope someone put me in something (laughs). Like, don’t be delusional, but then also, I’m allowed to be delusional!

So, I want to make things and write things. My writing partner is my best friend Max, and I love sitting down with a queer person and being like, yeah, that’s so queer, and we’re not even talking about gay things. There’s a way you can intrinsically make something that way. I want that in the things I’m making, but I also want to play all kinds of characters. I think it would be great to be an airheaded action star. Not that action stars are dumb, but the character. I’d love to be a monster who gets to wear a lot of prosthetics. I just want to do a plethora of things. Act, write, and work.

Before we wrap up, are there any other upcoming projects or anything else you’d like to mention or plug?

I recently did an audiobook! Mason Deaver wrote this really cool young adult love story called I Wish You All the Best, and I was so jazzed to do this project because I was like, this book would have been so cool to have as a teen. It has a trans lead, it’s a lot of fun. I don’t usually see people plug audiobooks because you’re not in it the same way, but I think people should listen to it. It’s a neat piece of literature to have, and it was fun to be a part of. Then I can’t really talk about some other things, so just keep and eye out for upcoming announcements!

Stay up-to-date and connect with Barack by following him on Twitter and Instagram @zachbarack. Dead End: Paranormal Park is now available on Netflix.

Photos courtesy of GeoGeoGeo and Netflix