Brandon Flynn in That F— Toys Sex Scene and James Dean Guy Biography

The theme of this year’s LGBTQ Film Festival in New York City is “Queer Film is an Act of Rebellion.”

“We are in a moment where we need to raise our voices,” festival executive director David Hatkoff told me before the festival opened tonight. “We need to make our presence known. We need to tell the world and those who want to marginalize us or completely erase us that we’re not going anywhere… I think what festivals like NewFest do is create a space where people can be in community, be reminded that they’re part of something bigger than themselves, and even feel joy as an act of rebellion.”

One movie that definitely offers unusual storytelling is “Fucktoys.” Writer-director Annapurna Sriram’s NSFW John Waters-esque black comedy follows a stripper and sex worker (Sriram) in a fictional place called Trashtown as she tries to get $1,000 to pay a tarot card reader (Big Freedia) to help rid her of a mysterious curse.

“I feel like it captures the spirit of ‘queer film is an act of rebellion’ very beautifully,” Hatkoff says. “We can march in the streets but we can also gather 500 gay people in a room to laugh hard at a movie as outrageous as ‘Fucktoys.’ The laughter that will echo through the walls of the SVA Theater on Friday night is rebellion.”

In the film, “13 Reasons Why” star Brandon Flynn plays an actor working in the area who hires a trans sex worker (Sadie Scott) for an afternoon of exotic delights.

Flynn’s sights are not for the discerning pearl enthusiast. At one point, he is shown being caught wearing a rubber jockstrap and a gold-plated penis extender.

His character’s name is – Get ready! -James Franconi. “Obviously this features some familiar names in the industry, but it’s really a combination of the two actors I used to craft it,” Flynn says. “One of these actors starred in a movie that was very autobiographical for him, and he said in an interview how the character he was playing had a larger appendage than he did. So he was basically dressed like an extender so he would feel like he had a bigger one. I was like, ‘This is actually quite crazy.’

As for the fist sequences, Flynn explains that he enjoys stepping out of his comfort zone to discover and embrace unexpected performances. But, quite simply, he says he knows famous actors who practice strange plays. “I know a lot of sex workers who have had to sign non-disclosure agreements for high-profile clients,” Flynn says. “I thought it was an interesting and honest element of the story that Annapurna was telling, which is that there is this hypocrisy and dual worlds and infrastructures and systems that are in constant friction with each other.”

In Flynn’s credits he stars as James Dean in “Willy and Jimmy Dean,” a biopic about a supposed gay college romance with William Bast. Written and directed by Guy Guido, the film is based on Bast’s 2006 memoir, “Surviving James Dean.”

While rumors of Dean being more flexible than not have persisted since his untimely death at the age of 24 in 1955, Flynn didn’t mince words when asked why it took so long for his bizarre life to be addressed in a movie. “The short answer is I think the whole world is homophobic,” Flynn says. “He really became the ultimate masculine icon. Like hardcore, James Dean is a real man. But he was also emotional. I think that shakes people, especially people’s fragile sexual orientation. I think it’s important to expose these stories because Jimmy wasn’t the only one.”

Flynn has been openly gay for most, if not all, of his career. “I can’t imagine living any other way,” he says. “I’m proud to be an outsider and I’ll be singing it from the rooftops. There’s a legacy about it and a responsibility to it.”

NewFest takes place from October 9-21 In New York City and online.