iley Carter Millington doesn\'t want to be labelled as a "transgender actor".
The 23-year-old star made soap history by becoming the first transgender man to play a regular transgender character on a British soap in October 2015 when he made his \'EastEnders\' debut as Kyle Slater, but he is keen to play more characters who are cisgender - an individual whose gender matches their "assigned" sex at birth.
He said: "I\'m proud to be transgender, but I like to explore different things and different roles as an actor.
"I don\'t want to just be pigeon-holed into trans roles, I want to explore the cisgender roles.
"The trans label should be taken off - just see us as actors."
While Riley - who departed \'EastEnders\' after one year - believes his part in the BBC One soap has "opened the pathway for other roles", he admits it is "more of a struggle" to land cisgender roles.
He added to the BBC: "[It] feels like we are cast as people with a limited ability when there\'s a massive range of ability.
"[It\'s] more of a struggle to get those cisgender roles."
Following his \'EastEnders\' departure in November 2016, Riley felt "frustrated" that his character didn\'t get a chance to have a "normal life".
He said: "I was disappointed it was not shown that Kyle had a normal life. He had the big coming-out story and it was dramatic and emotional, but we didn\'t get to see a happy ending, like a relationship of any sort other than the reunion with his half-sister, Stacey. It was frustrating.
"I felt I let myself and the fans down as I could have pushed for something. It\'s a shame to have gay characters and then you have to say goodbye."
21 July 2017 - 12:00 PM
