Transgender Film - Eva Robins in 'Mascara' (1987)

Eva Robins Transgendered Actress & Her Film Mascara

Transgender celebrities are much more common place in todays world. If we go back to the 1980s a transgendered actor was very uncommon. We had many films which contained transgendered themes but many of the characters were played by CIS born actors. 

Eva Robins

A scene from Tenebrae with Eva Robins

I first became aware of the actress Eva Robins when I saw the film Mascara (1987) in which she stars with Michael Sarrazine and Charlotte Rampling. Eva by this time was already an established star appearing on many Italian talk shows. Her fame is very much centred around her own country, Italy and most of her work is in Italian language. Unless you were a horror fan in the 1980's you would have missed her perhaps most iconic dream like appearance in Dario Argento's Tenebrae, in a white dress and red high heels. 

Eva was born male in 1958, but developed naturally feminine features and breasts during puberty, despite being a normal boy growing up, her body failed to masculine like the other boys of her age. From the age of about thirteen she says she felt she wanted to be a female. When she was sixteen, she started oestrogen treatments. By the age of twenty-one she was living completely as a woman. 

Trans Bizarre  'Mascara' 1987 
Mascara, the bizarre trans exploitation 'Eurotrash' movie. Eva plays the part of a beautiful 'shemale' who performs at a secret night club, at the end of a pier, and through a secret underground tunnel. A private tranny club, where transgender performers mime to operatic pieces or take part in S&M rituals back stage. This club caters to weathly customers with bizarre tastes.  

Poster for Mascara

The basic story from the back of the VHS box : An aria of violence grips the heart of the opera world! And terror strikes the twilight existence of the transvestite! Investigating an apparent suicude, police inspector Sanders is visited by an attractive and convincing member of the transvestite community. Lana informs him that the suicude was actually murder and a warped maniac is engulfing her friends' subterranean lifestyle in a dark web of decadence, blackmail and sleazy corruption.

A spectacular ball gown, borrowed from the opera's costume designer, holds the clue to the identity of the killer. But Mascara can hide a multitude of twisted sins....

Pepper wears the dress and mimes to an operatic piece.

Sadly the film is only available on VHS on the second hand markets, so if you want a copy check eBay.