ABSTRACT
Dallas Buyers Club earned Academy Awards for its two male stars, Matthew McConaughey and Jared Leto, legitimizing their creative work if also arousing controversy given the film’s framing of the 1980s AIDS epidemic through a straight male and a trans character, both played in this independent film by straight, cisgender men. This chapter focuses in particular on the two actors’ individual and complementary performances, including the negotiation of that work in interview and review discourse. This discourse defines the film as a showcase of male performance, rather than, or in addition to, an activist account of the 1980s AIDS epidemic. The film and its promotional and reception discourse amplify the distance between McConaughey and Leto’s screen characters and their off-screen personas. This distance constitutes a key part of the film’s public articulation, performance, and affirmation of allyship. As film text and discursive object, Dallas Buyers Club engineers a narrative of allyship, with the possibilities and pitfalls that accompany efforts from members of dominant classes to grasp the experiences of marginalized groups. Overall, the chapter addresses a range of questions around screen representation, performance, and the discursive surround of trade-press coverage, interviews, and industry awards.
