Dua Saleh has never been one for boundaries. The musician, poet, and activist is known for blending genres and styles to create lyrical, pulsating tracks that feel wholly original. That same restless, near-defiant creative impulse shines through in their groundbreaking acting debut, on the third season of Sex Education, streaming on Netflix September 17.
“It transformed my life and the way that I think about art,” Saleh tells them. of their move into acting, over Zoom from their home in Minneapolis.
Saleh plays Cal Bowman, Sex Education’s first nonbinary character. In line with the title of the series, Cal serves in part as a vehicle for the season’s insightful exploration of gender identity and expression. They become a frequent target for Moordale’s new hard-nosed head teacher, Hope (played by Jemima Kirke), and catch the eye of former star athlete Jackson (Kedar Williams-Stirling) in what is perhaps the season’s most intriguing romantic plot.
The newly minted actor isn’t stepping away from music, either. Their new single, “Fitt,” is due out September 24, followed by an EP, aptly entitled Crossover, inspired by their experience filming the series, which comes out October 22.
In advance of their inaugural TV role, we talked to Saleh about Cal’s journey in season three, the multiplicity of nonbinary identity, and the role of storytelling in the fight for social change.
Your primary modes of expression as an artist until now have been poetry and music. How did it feel to move into acting?
It feels amazing, and challenging because it’s such a different medium and I haven’t really worked in film or TV before. Most of the art that I create is informed by my own experience. Uprooting myself from that understanding of self to an understanding of an entirely different being, who may have some similarities to me but is very different from me as well, altered how I understand people’s journeys, especially with regards to transness and queerness.
You also have a history of activism. Do you see acting as a potential avenue for advancing social causes through storytelling?
Definitely. I think Sex Education as a whole does that really well. The series has been able to [present] a deeper analysis of different identity markers that people hold.
They’ve done that through Cal expressing the fact that they use they/them pronouns — and that they struggle with anxiety and the institutional power schemes that try to bog them down. The fact that they are expressing to their love interest, “I’m queer, and if you are engaging with me in any way because of my gender, you would have to be queer in order for you to be comfortable with that.”
These are things that queer youth think about all the time, that trans people think about. Although I’m not sure if Cal is trans specifically; I know that Cal’s nonbinary, but that wasn’t specified.
That’s also an important element, because there are a lot of nonbinary people who are still grappling with that understanding of what nonbinary means to them, and what gender means to them. And that doesn’t necessarily always equate to transness, especially amongst people who are searching for an indigenous understanding of their gender, people who are gender anarchists, who don’t necessarily want to engage with the concept of gender as a Western binary, or as something that tells you what to do, or who you are.
There are many different ways that nonbinary identity unfolds. And I think the fact that there's the breathing room for Cal to just be a teenager who’s trying to figure it out, or that it’s still nebulous to them — I think that’s really beautiful.
Absolutely. In season three, Moordale is under tyrannical rule by a new head teacher named Hope, and we see how different characters push back against her. Cal is a frequent target for not wearing the “correct” uniform, and has legitimate grievances, like being forced into binary sex-ed and not having a comfortable place to change. But they are hesitant to speak out directly. Why?
I think Cal probably didn't want the onus of a totalitarian regime on their fucking shoulders. They’re just a teenager. They’re scared, they’re a stoner. They didn’t want to be carrying everybody and educating everybody, because they probably have a lot to learn themselves. I think it’s probably fear, insecurity, feeling shut down. Cal experiences so much transphobia throughout the show, especially through Hope, that it probably made them feel like a little bit fearful, as any child would if they were in a situation where an adult were putting them in harm's way, both physically — like them being pushed to that room by Hope — and emotionally.
Cal does confront Hope, suggesting that she’s pitting them against another nonbinary student. Cal asks her, “Is there too much power in multiple otherness for you?” How would you describe what Cal means by that?
I think there's power in numbers and in community-oriented resistance. I don't think Cal thinks about it in that same organizing-brain way that I’m thinking. But Cal's probably like, “Oh, you're intimidated by us? Why are you so scared of two small trans kids who are trying to express themselves? What exactly is it that you’re fearing?” And I think what Hope may be fearing is loss of power and strength, that people will galvanize against her when in reality, people are just trying to exist as they are, and not be questioned for their lived reality.
Cal also suggests that Hope is pitting Layla, as a “good” non-binary person, against Cal as a “bad” one. Is that an argument about respectability?
Dichotomies are definitely used to create in-groups and out-groups, for who is allowed to have access to certain spaces and who’s shut out because of what their presence might do to deteriorate the power structures within those spaces. Layla, who’s played by my friend Robyn Holdaway, a wonderful nonbinary person who I love, comes from a place of deep pain and introversion as a result of all of the issues they’ve dealt with either at home or through school and the new rules that Hope has set in place.
And Cal comes from a place of unfurling. They burst through the scene like, “I don’t care what you say. I’m going to be myself. I may even have anxieties about being myself or expressing myself, but I literally cannot exist without doing this, and it’ll harm me if I don't. So I’m not going to." Like, “I’m not going to lessen my existence.”
When Cal and Jackson start to grow closer, it’s Jackson who seems to lose his footing. Cal tells him at one point, I think “your cis-het brain just exploded a little bit.” We’re used to seeing queer characters on screen struggling with their identity, but Cal seems uniquely self-possessed. How do you see that reflected in their relationship with Jackson?
Cal is sensitive to perception and to gendered readings from other people, specifically in this scenario. They’re aware of the lack of access to information that Jackson may have. They’re aware that they care about Jackson really deeply, but they also are aware that they have to take care of their needs to take care of their spirit. So when they asked Jackson how he perceives them and if Jackson understands what queerness is, in a way, that was Cal taking care of both of them.
There’s a scene when they're starting to get physical and Jackson calls Cal beautiful, then won't stop apologizing because he thinks of it as a gendered word. Cal doesn't seem to have a problem with it, but Jackson gets very flustered. What do you think we're seeing at that moment?
Cal is allowing vulnerability to take place and Jackson is attempting vulnerability, but isn’t being honest with himself. Cal’s thinking, “Oh yeah, I do feel amazing. I feel like this person in front of me is really beautiful, and I feel beautiful at this moment.”
And you can see Cal's frustration as Jackson leaves. They’re like, “What the fuck?”
I think they clocked easily that Jackson in that moment was fearful of gendering Cal in any particular way, both for his own sake, because he felt maybe fragile about Cal not being a girl, and I think Jackson felt anxious because his understanding of nonbinary isn’t as complex.
It’s a weird moment but also reflective of a lot of experiences that nonbinary people have with cis people they might be dating, who may not have access to the same amount of information about nonbinary identity or transness.
What else do you hope folks take away from Cal’s storyline this season?
Thoughtfulness and care for people within the LGBTQIA+ community. And the importance of communication in any relationship, especially in a relationship where there might be power differences, socially or politically.
Sex Education season three is streaming now on Netflix.
This conversation has been edited and condensed for clarity.
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