Nicky Endres — “Art Definitely Has Helped Me, As a Queer Person”

This is a rather special interview for me. Nicky Endres was my first professional interview subject at last year’s Pride parade, so this interview is coming full circle for me. Recently the Wisconsin-raised Endres and I sat down and had a deep, thoughtful conversation via phone about the evolving nature of queerness, gender theory, their recurring role on One Day At A Time, and how getting away from eyebrow acting landed them a huge role. Learn more about them below.

JENNIE ROBERSON: How did you come to identify as bi, or queer, or whichever term you prefer?

Nicky Endres: Gradually, over time. I identify as queer for non-queer audiences, but for those who are LGBTI-curious and academic, I identify as androphilic, which I consider a subset of the broader bi community.

This is kind of a reflection of my own journey as a nonbinary trans person. Trans men, or vulva on masculine men, or even nonbinary-identified people feel different to me than vulva on a cis woman. So if we’re talking purely sexual orientation, and turn-ons, and romantic potential, in my mind, the way somebody expresses their gender totally plays a part in whether or not they are even on the radar for me as a potential partner or flirtation. This may be temporary, I don’t know. It’s new to me — but what I like about it is it’s in line with my belief system of gender being such a construct. You could create sixteen more genders tomorrow, and there will be terminologies and identities and sexualities to go along with all of that.

But also, as a nonbinary person, I’m thinking, “Maybe I was always like this, or maybe this is a new thing,” like linguistic relativity. Because I have the notion of what androphilia is, my own notion of sexuality has expanded in a way it might not have, or at least what has remained subconscious.

My own personal journey [is] when you lack the language to describe yourself to others, let alone yourself, even when you have a deep, internal knowing of who you are, without the language to express or communicate that I felt like I didn’t exist. Or I knew I existed, but it didn’t mean anything. I couldn’t find external or even intrinsically internal validation other than going on blind faith that I have to wake up tomorrow morning and try again. I mean, all of that changed in intersectional feminist studies [laughs] at university.

I’m a very literal person. That’s part of my existential struggle with all of that — I love language. I’m a lover of words and the elegance and creative use of language. I was a double major — theatre and English — so I’m into the language arts. Even in my mundane, daily life, words and language are still art to me. Aside from clarity and efficiency being important, I also derive pleasure from being able to say what I mean and mean what I say in a way that’s super clear but also conveys who I am and where I’m coming from. I think a lot of us do that without even caring about a lick of that shit, [laughs] but for me, I derive pleasure out of it. It’s an active, cognizant processing for me. It’s like I can’t turn it off.

Long answer short, [laughs] “queer” is an easier thing to say than everything else.

How do you see yourself as an artist, and how does being androphilic fold into that?

NE: For me, art is a calling, for lack of a better word. That sums it up in familiar idiom, but it’s still not 100%; I’m still on that journey. I would say it’s an existential imperative for me. Art is the way I make sense of the world, and the way I naturally tend to communicate my inner experiences and ideas with others around me is art…

Yeah, I would say for me, I can’t really separate art from anything else about me. And I never could! So maybe I also take it for granted because I don’t know any other way. But especially as a queer person, art is the way I grew to understand who I was and discover my identity, and even more than that, fall in love with my identity and with the lives and identities of others like me.

In the cornfields where I grew up — I have a joke, “Intersectional feminism is like a cell phone signal, and I was getting zero bars. Just could not get a signal.” It wasn’t for lack of trying, it just wasn’t there, and you wouldn’t even know what to ask for. At least, I didn’t.

So for me, [as] part of my moral/spiritual code — just my way of life — I only wanna put stuff out there I can really stand behind. I only want to express myself in as close a way as I can possibly get it to what I truly think or feel. I wanna be very congruent with all of that. It annoys some people, and other people find it refreshing or interesting. But that [is] an example of my language arts, but also why maybe “calling” is an appropriate term for all of this. It’s all kind of low-key spiritual for me. It informs my belief system and everything I do.

Art definitely helped me as a queer person. I think art is a place where there are rules and techniques. But also, art is so wonderful because there’s this intangible, indefinable, amorphous, nebulous sort of primordial-ooze thing about it; you can’t necessarily always define it. You just have to do it. It’s kind of quantum for me, that thing that doesn’t exist if you’re observing it, [or] does it change based on observation.

Sort of a Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle?

NE: Yeah, yeah! So for me, with my queer identity, now they’re getting the artistic landscape where imagination and possibility allowed me to exist as a queer person in ways a binary, heteronormative, cis-normative world didn’t make room for.

What has your experience been like being out as a queer artist?

NE: A bunch of things ran through my head when you said that.

I really take for granted how frictionless my art and my identity as an artist has been my entire life. Thinking all the way back [to] when it was a protective shield growing up a queer, Asian kid in a cornfield full of white folks who didn’t understand me [and] had no idea what to do with me. The kind version of that was (I was a “he” at the time) “Well, he’s just artistic.” Which is the kind, cishet normative code to say, “I have no idea what this queer, queen, unicorn creature is doing or is, but they’re not that bad.”

“Queer, but harmless.”

NE: Yeah. If they’re gonna challenge you, it’s gonna be in your heart and your mind, not with physical violence or existential annihilation. (Although a lot of people view gender-nonconforming and trans people as existential annihilation for the binary construct of gender altogether).

It’s like binary coding a computer, and all of sudden, you try to use a different programming language — a fundamental thing it’s just not built on — and it explodes. It cannot compute. 404, page not found. Just because you can’t find it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.

Art was a sanctuary for me, to be taken as I am without having to define anything beyond “I’m a weird, quirky, creative person with a lot of interests.” So yeah, even though I make no money [laughs] and I’m so frustrated about the marketability of the things I do, I still feel really proud. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I think you succeed. I think your résumé reflects that if it’s any consolation from artist to artist.

NE: Oh, thank you! [Laughs]

Is there anything about yourself you would like people to know that maybe isn’t part of your public persona?

NE: Ever since I was a teenager and I came out and overcame my first major bout of depression, I was like, “You know what? Radical honesty. If I have no secrets, nobody can blackmail me.” If I’m just honest with everybody, then they can decide whether they like me or not based on real evidence, not based on prejudice. You can say, “Oh, I don’t like Nicky because they’re queer,” or you can be like, “Oh, Nicky gives a lot of unwarranted opinions that are mean-spirited — that’s why I don’t like Nicky.” [Laughs]

I used to do that. I was very defensive. I feel like any of that narcissistic, mean-spirited, offensive attitude and behavior was trying to get ahead of what I perceived to be growing up with bullying and so many micro-aggressions my whole life. I was a person who was really hurting.

Now I would say, if anything, today it’s like the reverse. Instead of thinking, “Oh, I’m this private person and putting things out in the world.” It’s more like I want to be publicly known. I wanna be me, and I just always assumed that someday I’ll be someone people I don’t know are interested in.

So I kind of reverse-engineer what I hope to be a more public success, really. But something I do leave out of my personal branding — but not face-to-face encounters — is I have a really dark side. A lot of what fueled my comedy has been this crippling cynicism and pessimism, and seeing the worst in people. (Again, I think that’s residual psychology from feeling people were always out to get me — whether it was actual, physical assault and hate-crime-ing me, or even just taking advantage of somebody who didn’t have a lot of money). I felt like nobody would take me seriously and would try to con me.

I still have this dark side, and it fuels everything — it fuels all the beautiful things in my life. I’ve made peace with it, and I choose not to say certain things that are my first reaction, ‘cause I realized this darkness is a part of me. Everybody probably has it, you know; I can’t be alone in this.

It’s important for me to transmute it into something more congruent with my belief structure. I give it room to breathe, but it’s not stuff I would ever say publicly. I think we all have to have that sort of discipline — if anything, the internet is a horrible place because people decide they’re gonna unleash that darkness since they don’t have to be accountable ‘cause they’re anonymous. I take the reverse approach because I want to be publicly successful in the industry in some way. It’s the opposite of anonymity.

And we’re allowed to make mistakes, but I feel very comfortable telling people if I fucked up. I don’t see any reason to hide it. I’ve been hated for so many things beyond my control I can be hated for things that are real.

NICKy from Heath Daniels on Vimeo.

In my research, I found and loved your short film, NICKy.

NE: Oh, yeah! That was in OutFest!

How did that project come into being?

NE: My friend, Heath Daniels, was actually my next-door neighbor at the time. We had done a film together before — we were acting together — and that’s how we met. We were just artistic, act-ie, art-ie, filmie-makie friends. That was at the beginning of my transition. Even though I didn’t medically transition, I still consider it a transition between living as a feminine, cis-gay male and full-on, feminine transfeminine [person,] just living my life as a woman.

Heath is a gay man, and he was really fascinated and intellectually interested [in that process.] He was like, “I’m your friend; I knew you when you were a go-go boy, and I know you now, and I think you’re great. You’re such an interesting person, and your point-of-view is interesting. Let’s do a short.” And I was like, “Oh. All right." “So tell me about gender.”

What I used to tap into that project [was] how gender is such a construct that we even have scripted behaviors and postures in terms of gender expression. And, really, gender expression [is] for whose benefit? Is it ours? Some of the things that we do are natural and happen to be coded as masculine or feminine by a binary society. And other things we do on purpose in order to be seen as a certain gender by other people.

I told him how in undergraduate theatre, we learn posture and different ways of walking, of breathing, of movement — they’re metaphorical. Within the world of theatre, they help tell stories about these characters you’re watching from far away. It’s not cinema where the camera gives the focus to you as an audience member. In theatre, you have to be so much more specific in your intention, but huge so you can be visible. So it’s a different medium. So we talked about how if you want to seem larger and imposing and more masculine, slow your movements. (That translates on film and everything, actually). But it was exaggerated in such a way for theatre in order to read to the audience that I really took it to heart. I learned how to walk in heels because of theatre, I learned how to apply make-up ‘cause of the theatre.

As an actor in theatre, you create so much of that [world] yourself. Again, it’s a different medium. But when you’re a theatre actor, you do your own make-up. You even do your own wigs! (Unless, you know, Broadway). But you do so much by yourself, whereas in film and television, I can totally focus on my character, and everything else is more collaborative.

Long story short, I condensed that into a media short. Just sort of reflective monologuing, [and] he filmed me doing make-up, some hair, and filmed me without [me] being, like, naked-naked. Just being in my body.

The point wasn’t transforming before your eyes, like in Drag Race, where it’s spectacular and glorious, but in a really subtle way. We take gender so for granted, but I put a little curl in my hair, put a little bounce in my step, and suddenly I’m a different gender.

I said, “I choose what gender you see,” but we’re more than those things. I think the self-awareness of all of that is where the power comes from because it’s not disempowering for an individual personally, but it allows you to think how that applies to everyone else in the world.

I understand you have a background in martial arts. Can you tell me a bit more about that?

NE: Yeah! Actually, martial arts is fundamental to who I am and the way I do things.

I was put in martial arts by my mom as a teenager, and it was because someone she knew — a white American — taught a Korean martial art because I was lost and unhappy. She didn’t really pick up on queer because we didn’t have a concept for that; she thought, “Oh, well, it’s because you’re not fitting in; you’re the only Asian person, and being in martial arts might put you in touch with your Korean heritage.” And I’m like, “Well, that’s very generous and very cute.” But also, I think there was a subconscious [reason]— this is the Matthew Shepard/Brandon Teena era; queers are getting killed in cornfields. So I think it was a matter of time before they all realized, “Oh, this kid is queer — that’s why they’re so weird. That’s why we don’t understand them.” Also, I was weak and cowardly; I was afraid of myself, I was afraid of everything.

Martial arts gave me a lot of personal strength and discipline because [it] is such a way of life. And it is truly an art. Martial arts has all of its origins in spirituality, and that is what resonates the most with me to this day. [They] are a metaphor for the tension human beings have within ourselves, with each other, in the world over time.

I just think it’s absolutely beautiful. And it’s such a one-to-one analogy — we’re working on your patience or working on your strength. It’s very literal. “Do some more fucking push-ups.” [Laughs] “Get stronger. Work on your flexibility.” It’s not just so I can kick high and look awesome. How do you want to be flexible in life? How can you go with the flow and be able to be swept away by the tide but also be strong and hold your place when you need to? It’s all very Eastern philosophy-based, so there’s a lot of Taoism and Buddhism in most martial arts.

I would say I did definitely get in touch with the Asian undercurrent of what martial arts is. But I don’t think it was because I’m Asian; if anything, it’s just a coincidence that I am. Even if my mom hadn’t done that, I would have taken part in it because a handful of years later, I became obsessed with becoming a warrior princess. Whatever path would have [eventually] brought me to martial arts — I would have found it eventually.

Even when I’m not currently studying at a school, I consider myself a martial artist. It’s very much a core part of the way I do things. And I approach acting that way and stand-up that way; it’s a martial arts life, for sure.

Most readers will best know you from your work on the reboot One Day At A Time. How did that project come to you?

NE: It was a conventional audition.

I knew One Day At A Time because I saw it on Netflix, and I loved it, and I love sitcoms. So I knew the flavor and the energy and the therapy group I would be added to.

One Day At A Time saved my career in so many ways. I hadn’t worked in five years. I came out and couldn’t find any work. That was before there was a really strong move in Hollywood to be gender-expansive and trans-inclusive. And because I was a nonbinary trans, it’s not like my reps could [pitch me as] “Oh, she’s a woman now.” No. I had an Adam’s apple, and I was working on pitch modulation and different ways to use my voice after years of being trained as a boy to speak lower. It was a lot of mechanical training that we who are actors — you know this — our instrument is us. It’s our body. That’s the paint, the palette, and the canvas. So it wasn’t like I could walk in and go for cis-female roles. And now, out of principle, if they’re making room for trans people, I’m gonna be out as a trans person.

ODAAT was a dream come true because it’s a show I love that’s written so well, and it’s so great at capturing the current zeitgeist as well as just forward-thinking. TV is all about trying to predict the next big thing. Some forms of art respond to what’s happening now, but TV is so quick. The best shows are always the ones that feel just a little ahead of their time, and when we look back at them, are like, “Wow, they ushered in a new era of television.” Now all the shows wanna be the next Fleabag or the next Game of Thrones.

And I think ODAAT is one of my favorite shows because it’s the most classic, contrived formula for any type of television genre, the live studio audience multi-camera sitcom like a play. And the writing is so good, and they make it seem like it’s a reinvented art form. It’s so many great minds who are all assembled to work as a team, but the collaborative energy is very strong.

I just have so much respect for it, and I’ve learned so much. And that’s the kind of work I always wanna be doing now.

You also have been featured on the AmBi float in Pride. What was that experience like for you?

NE: Well, I was thinking, “Okay, how do I help get some publicity for One Day At A Time,” because we had just been canceled by Netflix before it found a home with PopTV. The regulars were still technically contracted through the summer, but Sheridan (Pierce) and me, who are recurring [saw] an opportunity to help two communities I care about, ‘cause I’m a member of Ambi.

So what can we do? Could we get celebrities or any type of hype? The previous year with the floats and unicorns, there was so much done in-house for Ambi by the members. I remember it being beautiful and wonderful, but everyone was also just exhausted; it took months and months and months for one parade. We don’t wanna do that every single year.

And it just popped in my head to ask. I mean, One Day At A Time is very all-encompassing queer and bridge-building and intersectional. So I messaged Gloria (Calderon Kerrett), one of the co-showrunners, and she was like, “Oh, that’s great!” [The point person] set up a meeting and made it happen. Justina (Machado) and Todd (Grinnell) had just gotten back from a Texan press junket. And India (de Beaufort) — Todd’s wife, who’s also cast on the show — was there.

It was really magical. You know that phrase “kill two birds with one stone?” I felt like I was helping two communities at one time. I would love to be in a position where I have either the clout or the influence to do that in a way that really matters. I mean, I obviously sit to benefit if one of my favorite shows (before I was even on it) got another season. And if my Ambi community would have a kickass float and get good press from the Pride parade. It was a win-win.

There’s so much in the art and entertainment industry that’s fundamentally competitive that, as an artist, I don’t wanna get caught up in the economy of the scarcity of it all because it’s soul-killing. I wouldn’t be able to stay in an artistic career if I was obsessed with my competition booking something I didn’t get. And so any time I can be involved in situations where everybody gets to win, it’s beautiful. Maybe it’s really optimistic of me, but I don’t think it has to be as hard as we make it. There can be wins all around.

You also recently had a hilarious guest star role on a little show called NCIS: Los Angeles. Can you tell me a bit more about that?

NE: I love talking about this one. This is my martial arts mentality on acting; I’m never gonna be the best or the worst, but I’m always trying to be better than last time or work on something that was holding me back or I was unhappy with in a previous audition.

Like in a previous audition, I felt like I didn’t book it because I’d done too much “eyebrow acting.” [Laughs] I’m very expressive as a normal person. I had prepared for this other thing I was really proud of, but it was totally wrong. I’d thought I had made really great choices, but it turned out I’d made all the wrong ones. But the thing is, if you’re gonna be wrong, be wrong big.

So then I got NCIS: L.A. I remember thinking, “Oh, this is a procedural; I don’t think I’ll ever fit into this anyway.” But you know what — there was a great stage direction in the sides for this character: “they are too cool for school: they’re so cool that even when they care, they’re still poker-faced about it.” Without someone telling me that, I would never have made the choices I made with the character — acting like you can’t be bothered. And then, as a personal acting challenge, I thought, “You know what? This one? Not gonna move my eyebrows at all. [Laughs] Nicky, you’re an eyebrow actor, so no eyebrows this time.” And I found the character’s droll, bitchy sense of humor, and I was like, “This is totally me, but my delivery is very different.”

So it was an easy thing to slip into, and I had a blast doing it. But what made it even better, two things; one is it’s specifically written for a nonbinary character... So one, I felt like, oh — space is being made specifically for me. But the thing that made it the best was that Lily Mariye was the director for that episode. And Lily Mariye is a Japanese-American filmmaker and actor. She was on E.R. — she was the Asian nurse for, like, fifteen years. And job-shadowed on that job and learned how to direct while being there. She is an absolute joy to work with, and I love her. She’s all about giving as many opportunities [as possible] to other women and women of color- especially Asian women — to work in this industry in any capacity. When I booked and was working with her, I was touched; she said: “When you walked in, I was just like, ‘Please let them be good! [Laughs] I wanna hire the Asian one if I can’!”

That was a super-affirming job for me, too, because what is more mainstream than network procedurals? And here they have an Asian woman directing an episode with a bunch of other Asian-American actors playing characters. And it’s not explained why we have to be Asian, why we’re there. It’s L.A., so of course, you’re gonna have a bunch of Asian people in your stories; it’s L.A, we’re everywhere. And I’m a nonbinary, artsy-fartsy, bitchy queen. Of course! I mean, like, why wouldn’t you?

So the move towards inclusivity and even adding texture and culture to the most formulaic and familiar of all of our favorite types of entertainment is great. I felt fulfilled as an artist because I had made a choice based on personal growth that actually ended up getting me the job. It was very validating as an actor.

You’ve recently started delving into the world of stand-up comedy. What is it about the art form that appeals to you?

NE: What appeals the most to me about stand-up comedy is that it’s so manipulative.

Not the answer I expected at all! Tell me more.

NE: So honest. For me, stand-up is the best therapy.

Let me expand on that. I have what my therapist friend called a tendency towards criminality, and mine is Machiavellian. I like to control and manipulate and toy with people and push their buttons. I used that defensively growing up to avoid bullying or getting beaten up. [But] I always used it defensively — it’s not like I was out there conning widows out of their pearls.

I started comedy shortly after I came to the realization my cynicism was not charming or funny but crippling. It was hurting me, and it was hurting my partner, who I love very much. It wasn’t an ironic nihilism for me anymore; it really became a worldview. It kept me unhappy, and I didn’t realize it until my partner pointed out I was hurting him — not in an emotionally abusive way, but if you’re hanging around a thunderstorm all the fucking time, even if you don’t get electrocuted, that shit’s around you all the time. So I really took that to heart.

I actually did ayahuasca and meditated on it, and I realized... “You know what, Nicky, it’s not about getting rid of this cynicism or my criminality; instead of getting rid of it, how can we use them to be more in line with the beautiful things I wanna do?” And at that moment, people [started encouraging me to do] stand-up, so I thought I might as well give it a try. So I took a class and learned all about [stand-up] comedy, and I fell in love with it.

The whole thing about stand-up, especially, is it’s all manipulation. It’s the most fine-tuned controlling of emotion. The only other thing that’s as manipulative is musical scoring for movies — in particular, horror movies. You make the audience feel one thing, but it’s all a red herring because you’re setting them up to feel this other thing you want them to feel. There’s a psychology to it, an imaginative, magical quality to it. It just ticks all the boxes of all the things I love and all the things I do naturally — even the negative dark things that were becoming damaging to me and the people I love.

So now, I use my cynicism as a guide and not as a tool. In order to create a really impactful joke, it’s gotta start from a place of discomfort or tension, or we call them “complaints.” It’s conflict, and it has to come from a place of conflict. Because if the end result is laughs or release, you can’t feel joy and relief and catharsis; you can’t have those experiences unless you had something you bottled up previously.

So I’m finding organically my voice in this hybrid between performance art, stand-up comedy, and literature. The way I approach writing, I sometimes spin out into what’s the metaphorical conceit. You know what, honey? Sure, you can outline it, you bullet point it, but you really need to write it. And what I’m learning more and more about myself is I’m an okay writer, but I’m a really good editor.

So now I get it; it’s just changing that perspective. Maybe it hurts to sit down and write and organize my notes, but after I have that first draft, I love going back to it. For me, that’s when the magic happens. But getting that first draft, to have something to work with at all, that’s just so hard. [Laughs]

Tell me about Asian-American-Eyz’d and how that came together.

NE: Asian-American-Eyz’d is all about our experiences as the elder Millennial generation; we’re all roughly the same age, and we’re all intersectional. Between the three of us, we’re all femme and/or queer, and/or Asian, and/or immigrants.

The idea for it came out of Ana (Tuazon Parsons), who’s the executive producer, who was having a really frustrating and depressing season ‘cause she had been going out a lot and not booking. It’s super-extra-frustrating to be intersectional in an industry where... I’m always telling my non-entertainment friends we in entertainment get jobs based on the very discrimination you’re protected from. That gets so frustrating. As an artist, when you’re depressed and frustrated and bottled up, create. Just make something. Make something shitty to take the pressure off making something brilliant, but just make something. I would argue that is good advice for everyone, but especially for artists.

Oh yeah, I go bananas if I go straitlaced for too long. I have to go write or play my piano or paint — something’s gotta give, or I lose it.

NE: Right. It’s an existential imperative for us.

So Ana recruited Aidan (Park) and me, and I’m just like, is this because we’re all friends? But it ended up being a perfect storm. We all have such different energies, but we work together really well.

We came up with three miniature one-person shows that ended up being a trio of stand-up comedy. And it’s all centered around our Asian-American experiences and identities, assimilation, and micro-aggressions we face. And personal things regardless of those factors.

So it started off like we’ll make this thing and put it on iPhones. [But then] we just got really lucky collaborating with a lot of artists in L.A. and in the industry.

I discovered through watching the playback that this is where I belong. Maybe it’s not stand-up, or maybe it’s not multi-camera comedy, but there’s something about the conversational connection with the audience as well as telling the story that, for me, is where my artistic home is. I still love doing single-camera drama; not saying I would never do that, not saying I don’t love it. But my favorite — if I had to choose my favorite — is not just communicating with other characters that we’re living magically in front of others for ninety seconds at a time [laughs]. It’s the audience.

What advice would you give to someone who is newly out as bi or queer, and/or what advice do you wish you could have given yourself before you came out?

NE: Something I like to tell myself and others is, be the you today that the younger you needed most.

So if I were to tell my younger self anything, who was queer and not knowing anything, [it’s] be kind to yourself. You may not know what to type into the search bar, but that’s okay. If it’s chicken or an egg, just choose. Make a choice. Maybe you don’t have any words for yourself, but you can choose to love yourself in spite of it. When the world tells you that you shouldn’t exist, or you can’t exist, if you know that’s wrong and you can’t prove it, and you don’t have the language, just be. Just fucking be. (And that’s an ideal situation because for some people, it’s not safe to be, or they would be murdered for it).

Whatever small kindnesses you can give yourself — if it’s by yourself in the shower — if that’s the only time you feel you can really be you, fucking use it. Just being kind towards yourself goes a long, long way.

*** This interview was conducted on 3/13/2020 and has been edited and truncated for brevity and clarity.