From controversial trans* character Max in the L-Word to Calvin the Iraq Vet and bomb expert recruited to the feminist revolution in Itty Bitty Titty Committee, Daniela Sea’s roles are nevertheless nowhere near as fascinating as she is. She’s travelled through India as a man, played in punk bands, performed in circus troupes and moshed with the Riot Grrls.

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The Itty Bitty Titty Committee tells the story of the feminist awakenings of Anna, a receptionist in a plastic surgey at the hands of a bunch of feminist girl-guerillas, the CIA (Clits in Action). The CIA graffiti, culture jam and generally cause mayhem in their quest to bring down the patriarchy. The high intensity of the politics gives way to comedy as the CIA get sideswiped by the ups and downs of love.

Daniela Sea was introduced to Itty Bitty Titty Committee creator, Janey Babbit, by L-Word Producer and director of D.E.B.S, Angela Robinson. Babbit was keen to get Sea on board before she had any idea where she wanted to cast her in the project. She was eventually cast in the role of Calvin, a veteran of Iraq who had been kicked out of the army for being gay. Sea explains that her character was ‘just trying to find herself and this group of feminists pick her up and just kind of funnel all of her expertise in bomb building into their plan to overtake the patriarchal system.’

One of the particular joys for Sea in making Itty Bitty was that the music and politics took her back to her love of punk music in the early days of the Riot Grrl scene.
Amid the male dominated punk music scene in Berkeley she recalled seeing Bikini Kill perform as part of a double bill and being blown away.

‘They were just amazing, they were like “Ok all the girls in the front, we want girls in the slam pit” and they were singing about feminist issues.’ Keen to be involved, Daniela added her address to the list collected at the end of the gig, following which ‘a bunch of fanzines’ arrived in the mail. At the time she wasn’t out yet, and she explained ‘I guess it was part of my feminist awakening – Lately I like the word lesbian ‘cos I think it’s really retro and cool – but my queer awakening …’

The burgeoning riot grrl scene was essentially underground, though this shifted with the publication of the magazine Sassy. Although published by riot grrls, publication of the essentially mainstream magazine eventually led to the dissolution of the essentially counter-culture nature of the scene. She said ‘using popular culture to introduce radical feminist politics is a pretty rad move, but then it got commodified and the word went around and it became a buzz word of some sort. But it was based on a real radical movement of girls trying to help younger girls feel empowered and play music and be part of the underground punk scene.’

Feminism is still something that Sea remains passionate about, despite the bad rap it’s consistently been given. ‘This idea that we’re these grim and really uptight people is totally not true – most of the feminists I know are having loads of fun and making all kinds of art doing really rad stuff it’s not these grumpy women who hate men or something it’s like people who are really creative, men and women who believe in equal rights and stuff.

‘I think every generation of radical feminists are trying to help in different ways to make feminism cool…What I think’s cool about Itty Bitty is that there’s humour in it’

At the time when she cast in the L-Word, as the character Moira/Max, Sea had only seen half of one episode of the show – as she rarely watched TV in the belief that her reality was unlikely to be reflected there. She realized however that the show could become a platform for some of her political views, ‘Once I started being involved with it what I realize about it was that it was a perfect tool to reach a mass amount of people and introduce pretty radical ideas and normalize them for people.’

Sea’s character became a flash point in blogs and discussion boards over the show’s depiction of Moira’s transition to Max. For some, the transition failed to represent the diversity of trans* experience, for others it simply wasn’t accurate. Sea acknowledges that some of the issues raised were valid.

‘It’s not perfect story telling,’ Sea said. ‘I don’t agree with all the ways the character went and I don’t think it’s a perfect portrayal at all. And I think I probably could have done a better job too, just being a humble person,’

She was particularly concerned by the storyline that saw Max becoming aggressive when starting on hormones. ‘There’s almost no research that proves that at all,’ argued Sea, ‘and I really fought against having that be part of the storyline.’

She does, however, acknowledge that TV series are constrained by their form in telling stories, and that there are limits to what can be expected from a series. For the character of Max in particular, the limitations were obvious. ‘When you’re the only representation of any kind of people it’s problematic,’ she said. ‘There’s no way you can represent everybody, you know, you’re just telling one story.’

As Sea explained further, ‘It’s about a certain cast and class of Los Angeles professional lesbians and how they maneuver, it’s not like any of my friends particularly but you know, some of the stories are similar and that’s kinda cool to see.

‘It becomes symbolic and I knew right away that it was just a very political thing to be part of, doing this character, and I know I did it with all my heart and I know that it’s built a lot of tolerance, so I’m pretty happy with it.’

Itty Bitty Titty Committee is out now on DVD.
For further information on Danial Sea, see www.danielasea.com