Olivia Colman Opens Up About Gender Identity and Feeling “At Home” in the LGBTQ+ Community

Olivia Colman is speaking candidly about gender identity, belonging, and why she feels deeply connected to the LGBTQ+ community.

In a recent interview with Them, the Oscar-winning actor, 52, reflected on her lifelong feelings around gender while promoting her new film Jimpa. The movie explores family relationships across generations, with characters spanning the LGBTQ+ spectrum.

“I think it’s a community that I love being welcomed into,” Colman said. “I find the most loving and the most beautiful stories are from that community. And I feel really honored to be welcomed.”

Colman, who is married to writer Ed Sinclair, shared that she has never felt fully aligned with traditional ideas of femininity. While she stopped short of placing a label on herself, she explained that her sense of identity has always felt fluid.

“Throughout my whole life, I’ve had arguments with people where I've always felt sort of nonbinary,” she said. “Don’t make that a big sort of title! But I’ve never felt massively feminine in my being female.”

She added that she often jokes with her husband about how she experiences herself. “I’ve always described myself to my husband as a gay man. And he goes, ‘Yeah, I get that.’ So I do feel at home and at ease. I feel like I have a foot in various camps.”

Colman also noted that many of the people closest to her don’t fit into rigid ideas of gender or sexuality. “I don’t really spend an awful lot of time with people who are very staunchly heterosexual,” she said, adding that the men she loves are “very in touch with all sides of themselves.”

The conversation ties closely to Jimpa, in which Colman plays Hannah, a filmmaker who travels with her nonbinary transgender teenager Frances (played by Aud Mason-Hyde) to Amsterdam to visit Hannah’s father, Jimpa, portrayed by John Lithgow. Jimpa is a gay man facing the realities of aging in a generation that never expected to grow old.

When Frances expresses a desire to stay abroad with Jimpa for a year, Hannah is forced to confront her own beliefs about parenting, family, and identity. The film explores generational differences, chosen family, and what it means to truly listen to the people you love.

Colman, who won an Academy Award for her performance in The Favourite, has long been praised for bringing warmth and humanity to complex characters. With Jimpa, she continues that trend—while also sharing a more personal side of herself.

Jimpa is currently playing in theaters in New York and Los Angeles.