Franqi French: “People Thank Me For Being Out”

The trajectory of entertainers’ careers usually have some fascinating — and funny — turns. For example, recent Oscar winner Brad Pitt once worked in a chicken costume for El Pollo Loco. Hopefully, something similar will be said for up-and-coming comedian (and former Easter Bunny) Franqi French.

Crowned as the newest winner of Stand-Up NBC, French is a new Angeleno who is ready to make waves in this town. An accomplished singer who got into stand-up by accident, French is poised to become comedy’s next mover-and-shaker. Read more about this funny, thoughtful woman.

JENNIE ROBERSON: How did you come to identify as bi?

Franqui French: [Laughs] You know what, I don’t really know how to answer that, I think because I’ve always been who I am. Sometimes I dated guys, sometimes I dated girls, so it’s never really been a thing I actively identified with or intentionally identified with; it was just who I’ve always been.

Coming out, so to speak, happened recently, mainly because I wanted to talk about my sexuality onstage. Being a comedian, I wanted the space to be able to do that. I have a daughter, so with her, it would be weird for her — in my mind, I’m thinking it might be weird for her — for me to talk about being bisexual if she knows I’m married to her father; that might be uncomfortable for her.

So I quote-unquote “came out" to her, and she didn’t care. [Laughs] She was just like, “Uh, okay, why are you telling me that?” And I explained it to her, and she was like, “I don’t... I don’t care.” So I was like, “Oh, ok, well that’s... cool.”

I moved forward from there — I decided I could discuss it onstage. And when people in my life that didn’t know found out that way — I didn’t know it was something to identify with. I just knew who I was and that’s the way I was, and for me it’s just always been okay, if that makes sense.

Absolutely — it totally makes sense. It sounds like you’re very open about your work with the people you love and onstage as well. You kind of have to be, in that profession.

FF: It’s not that I’m intentionally open. I think it’s more — I don’t think who anyone else is is anybody’s business. Meaning you can be whatever you are; it doesn’t make any difference to me. Are you a good human, are you a good person? Are you treating people well? That’s the stuff that matters. But who you are dating or what your sexual preference is, or your religion, why is that my business? What does it matter to me what you believe? As long as those beliefs aren’t actively hurting other people or have the intent or drive or goal of hurting people, I feel like it doesn’t matter.

I live as who I am, not out loud or in-your-face. And I feel like it’s my right, and everyone else’s right, to do that.

How do you see yourself as a comedian, and how does being bi fold into that?

FF: As far as my style of comedy, am I an activist comic...?

However you feel you naturally respond to that question. Do you feel like being bi is a major part of your work? Is it an afterthought? Is it part of your narrative that you want to make sure comes across?

FF: Well, that’s an excellent question.

So [there are] a few answers to that. I think for everyone who is a comedian, stand-up or maybe otherwise but specifically as it relates to stand-up, our experience — what makes us who we are — are all integral parts. Every aspect of that is an integral part of your stand-up because that’s how your point of view is formed. And everything you say that comes across onstage serves as a product of your point of view and experiences and who you are. So, absolutely, being bi is a big part of it, of course, because it has shaped and formed my perspective and viewpoint on certain things.

Does it inform my comedy? You know, I would have to say “yes” once again. Who I am as a comic, I don’t think I’ve really been sure for a long time. I just had these experiences, these thoughts, and I found funny ways to share them with people. So that was who I am with the substance behind it. It’s not that I try to educate or be an activist.

However, as of late, as I have been more open about my sexuality, I can’t even tell you the number of emails and messages I’ve gotten from people, men and women, who are bi and not necessarily open and out, thanking me for being out.

So that being the case, I have come to the conclusion and realization that visibility is important, because there are people suffering and one of the ways they’re [alleviating their] suffering is to see someone publicly taking that journey, or sitting in that truth, or being open about that. It’s apparently very helpful, which makes it important.

What has your experience been like being out as a bi comedian?

FF: Hmmm. Two things: I was never really “in” [the closet], but apparently some people didn’t know, so I was treated one way, and there’s definitely been a shift, which I find bizarre.

I dunno why, but coming out as bi, people actually treat me better. [Laughs] They seem to find me more interesting. Which if we really sat down and dug into my background and my whole story, being bi is the least interesting part of it. But the industry has been more open to me. And I’ve had a lot more opportunities since coming out.

Is that a part of it? I don’t know. I take it as being more truthful, [as someone] who’s coming across [as] more authentic. Maybe people are connecting with it more and that’s why more opportunities are coming my way. So I think that’s probably the biggest shift since coming out.

Wow. That’s incredible.

FF: Interesting, right? Yeah, usually no one cares!

I have a joke about that, too — when you’re bi, no one really cares; they go, “Oh, okay, great. So you know how to get a free drink at a bar, Franqi, we get it.” People don’t typically really care, but people are very intrigued and very interested.

I think maybe that comes from me being married to a man, and we have an ethically open relationship — he dates other people, and I date other people; I’m not dating anyone outside of him currently, I just don’t have the time or, really, the interest and would rather focus on my career in these moments. But people are fascinated by that aspect, so maybe that’s a big part of what’s piqued people’s interest.

And his friends — he’s older than me, [a] black gentleman — a lot of his friends are like, “This isn’t a thing in the black community, being bisexual and having an open relationship— what are you talking about?” That’s not really a thing that’s readily accepted or discussed or anything.

I don’t care what people are saying publicly, because I know his friends with his background are like that. And he’s like, “I don’t care. They might care, but say what you want. I don’t care.” And immediately — the first interview I did a few weeks ago — as soon as I came out, people started coming out of the woodwork and freaking out.

So maybe that’s the thing that’s making me more interesting. I don’t know. But people have been very receptive.

Is there anything you would like people to know about you that maybe isn’t part of your public persona?

FF: I played the Easter Bunny at a local mall in Fairfax, Virginia, for three years in a row. [Laughs]

How scary was the costume? ‘Cause I’ve never seen an Easter Bunny costume that wasn’t terrifying.

FF: I have a picture of it, and if I could ever dig it up, I will happily share it with you. Maybe we can do a whole Easter Bunny exposé.

But it was actually amazing. It looked like Peter Rabbit. Very cute, very friendly, very welcoming Easter Bunny. But I will also follow up by saying children are awful — they would kick me, they would pee on me intentionally, they would say mean things to the Easter Bunny. It was a horrifying, very rewarding experience.

Wait — horrifying and rewarding?

FF: I made stupid amounts of money in that suit. I was eighteen at the time. Basically, I sold my soul to the devil for that Easter weekend money.

I’d be like, “Your kid just peed on me.” The mom would be like, “Just let me take the picture! Lemme take one more picture!” The kids were animals.

Oh God, I get that. I’ve had jobs in costumes like Lady Liberty and stuff...

FF: So you get it.

I totally get it. I’d get the most sexual comments thrown at me and people thought it was totally okay.

FF: Because you’re not an actual human [to them]; you’re a concept.

It’s the same when you’re in entertainment. There’s a comedy writing room aspect to it where people see you as a product, a thing. The funny person. “They’re not a real person. You can’t say anything serious.” We’re humans underneath this public persona.

I have a picture with my mother in a suit and then just the Easter Bunny head on. [Laughs] Yeah, that’s the picture I would actually like to find ‘cause it’s horrifying. It’s absolutely terrifying.

How did you get into stand-up comedy?

FF: So I have six sisters, but one of those six sisters is also an actress. She’s more of a yogi now, but she was acting at the time, six, seven years ago. Her manager wanted her to try stand-up and improv, so she asked me to do a class with her. I was like, “Sure — I’m not doing anything creative, I’ll do it.” And I sent my $250 to sign up at the D.C. Improv, and she did not sign up.

So now I’m taking a stand-up class I had no intention of actually taking. And the first time I got onstage, I just loved it, and have since never been able to not get onstage.

As I’ve grown as a comedian, I look back and remember as a little girl always loving comedy. I was left home a lot, and I would steal my grandmother’s Richard Pryor or George Carlin, Eddie Murphy, or Redd Foxx records and I would put those on and listen to them and I would be so enthralled with the way they told their perspective. My home life was terrible, so listening to these people make fun of these tragic, interesting, funny, crazy, wild experiences was part of my solace growing up.

That, and music. As I got older, I was a singer for a long time, and then I found comedy, which I actually found is my first love.

Sorry, music, I love you, too, but comedy’s my bitch.

What style of singing were you into?

FF: I was in a rock, kind of funk band for a while. Then I had a — how would I put it — a George Clinton funkadelic soul band I sang with. And then I used to do solo stuff that was more Sarah MacLachlan-y. So I’d run the gamut. I love everything. I love country all the way to R&B, classical, pop-rock, all of it.

I sang “Mephistopheles” in Italian at the Kennedy Center when I was 12. I learned it in Italian, and it was a very difficult piece, and I killed it. That was amazing.

Fast forward to last summer, and I was invited to perform as part of Tig Notaro’s Bentzen Ball as part of... her future headliner series, which this year was all women, which is amazing...

We got to do a show at the Kennedy Center as well. Having a full circle with being able to perform there musically, and then comedy brought me back there. So that was kind of fortuitous and amazing.

You just moved to L.A. a little while ago [at the time of interview]. What are your impressions of it so far?

FF: I love L.A. I’ve been here since January 20th. One of my very dear friends of twenty years already lives here. We had been friends on the East Coast and worked together at Sprint PCS. We lost contact when she moved to L.A., and then reconnected through the wonders of Facebook. And when we reconnected, we had both just started doing comedy.

We’ve done a lot of really cool, fun things together. We did the Black Women In Comedy Festival last year; it was the very first one and we had a great experience with that. And from that, we created our own mini two-city tour. I mean, “tour” is a very luxurious word for what we were doing. But we plan on making it a bigger thing. She and I and three other black women created these events to showcase the talent of black women.

We are very much marginalized just in general, very specifically when it comes to stand-up. In the entertainment industry, we are the very lowest on the totem pole, and we are seen as “Well if we have one [black woman] per show, that’s all we need. Because they all do the same thing.” And going through that experience with the festival, it’s like wow, 50 black women all together, performing on a different series of sets, [and] everyone was so drastically different. So we got together to really take it on the road and showcase that.

It was a real learning experience, for sure; I’ve never done anything like that independently. It was really, really fun, and frustrating, and all the emotions. It was great to experience that with women that looked like me. We don’t often get opportunities like that, so it was kind of fun. Having clubs being able to back it was really nice.

It sounds really comforting to come to a new city and to have a friend like that. 

FF: Yeah, for sure. And about being here, since I’ve been doing comedy for a while, I know enough people on this side of the world. And with NBC behind me, it hasn’t been as difficult. It has been difficult, but I’m still working my way into different clubs and different spaces, but I have enough heat... enough comics know who I am, and people have been kind enough to offer me a spot.

I have a manager now, an entertainment lawyer, a business manager. All of those things are factoring in, and all that happened [from] just moving to L.A.

You’ve got a whole team! That’s really cool.

FF: Yeah! That’s amazing and extremely helpful.

You’ve already worked with an impressive list of stand-up headliners. What is one of the best lessons you’ve learned from watching them work up-close?

FF: To take the craft seriously.

There was a point where I would drink at shows— not overly, not obsessively — but I would treat it a little bit too much like a party. There’s nothing wrong with having a drink or two if that’s your thing, it’s fine. But I found myself using it for a crutch after a while. I would be nervous, so I would [say], “Let me have a drink before I go on to calm my nerves.”

And so I got this opportunity — I went with comics that are sober or have a hard rule of not drinking before you perform or while you’re working. So I conformed to that in the last three months. Thirty days before I moved here, I stopped drinking completely.

Wow. Congratulations!

FF: Yeah! Not for nothing, at some point, I will drink red wine again. Why? Because it’s the most perfect drink that’s ever been invented on the earth. But I needed to re-learn how to perform completely sober. And I think that helped my performance; it’s made me more creative, and I’m more leaning into thoughts I have onstage, whereas before [I] might have been nervous or apprehensive having alcohol in my system.

To be clear, this is not a bash or a condemnation of that; please, whatever you do, do it. Knock yourself out. It’s just for me, it’s a quality I saw in people I admired, and I adhered to that as well.

You won this year’s StandUp NBC competition, a high honor. What surprised you the most about that process?

FF: Hmmm. One of the biggest things that surprised me is that all the people involved on the side of the network — the executives and all the other people in the industry who came out to support or judge or do anything in regards to being part of the event or part of the process — they were extremely welcoming, very helpful, and really did everything they could to set you up for success.

I think a lot of us have this preconceived notion in the industry that it’s very judge-y. And yes, they’re judging you, but they’re also giving you tips (all of us together, not me, individually) and give all of us helpful hints... They were very prepared throughout the whole thing, which was quite surprising, and refreshing, and super helpful, and it took away a lot of the anxiety I think a lot of us had. 

You mentioned in one of your sets I saw that you grew up in a Muslim household. How, if at all, does that affect how you craft your art?

FF: I left Islam so long ago that it doesn’t really. I’d probably have to give it a lot more thought because, on some level, it does.

It’s just something I’ve left behind for whatever reasons I’ve done so. And maybe in the future when I’m ready to confront that part of myself again, it will inform my comedy. But I don’t think it’s something that does right now.

What would you say excites you the most about stand-up comedy?

FF: For me, it has been a very healing, very spiritual journey, and I’ve gotten to increase my platform.

Like, I recently shared a story about my journey of healing. And I got this huge outpour of emails from people profusely thanking me for sharing that story because they’re going through something similar and they didn’t have anyone to talk to. And it’s daily — every couple of hours, someone is messaging me [about it], telling me about their experience.

So for me, in the debate of whether I should even talk about it, my concern was about people thinking this was about me meeting a celebrity. That’s really irrelevant. The context of what the experience was, and the gravity of the energy and connection with humanity is really what the story is about. That’s the piece [of the story] I want everyone to walk away thinking about.

To go back and answer your question, that’s what it’s about — having this ability to grow a platform even beyond that, hopefully, work with more spiritual people who are more deeply connected than I am, and be able to use that to serve humanity. And hoping to be one of the humans that hear and [are] actively being a part of the healing, because we need it.

I’m not saying in any way, shape, or form that I, Franqi French, am gonna heal humanity. But I am more than happy to use my platform to be a voice that aids in that process, for sure. That’s the thing that’s absolutely, hands-down, most exciting. 

Tell me about “Laugh After Dark”.

FF: It’s an Amazon Prime show, two seasons in, this is season three. I just got cast as one of the feature comics on it.

You’ll get to see a lot more from the comics [this season.] It’s really a nice platform on a very popular application where other up-and-coming comics can get an opportunity to showcase their talents in front of a national audience they may not normally get to get in front of.

It’s cool: I just met one of the other comics, and she was in the semi-finals with me at Stand-Up NBC. She’s been a huge help — back to your earlier question about how things are going here [in L.A.] — she’s been a huge help with me getting sets and getting work out here in L.A.

Do you have any other upcoming projects?

FF: Not that I can say right now, but yeah, I have a lot of stuff happening.

Any advice for those who are newly out as bi, and/or any advice you wish you could have given yourself before you fully came out? 

FF: For me, my journey was fine. I have lost friendships from people not being comfortable with who I am, and I’m fine with that. Like I said, I’ve always lived as who I was, and that’s been a turn-off for some people.

So I think the most important thing is being comfortable and strong in who you are. If there’s anything about you — it doesn’t matter what it is — if there’s anything about you that is good and genuine and true, and you can’t change it and don’t want to, live it! It’s fine. Just live it.

And if anyone doesn’t like it or love it or accept it, then they’re just not for you. I know that that sounds very simple. And that means even if it’s a parent — I had to cut my mother off at one point in my life, and I didn’t have a relationship with her for the last six years before she passed away, and that was fine. And I know that sounds cruel and callous and horrible. However, for my mental health, and for me to be okay and not be a toxic, garbage human, I had to do that for my safety and my sanity.

Maybe that’s the thing I would have told my younger self — it is not okay to accept abuse from other people when you want to be a healthy person. It is okay to protect your sanity at all costs from anyone. Just because you’ve known someone, or had someone in your life for a long time, [it] does not mean they are supposed to be in your life.

So live who you are truthfully. The universe gets it, and all of the things meant for you will come to you regardless of all of the other things. That applies to more than just your sexuality.

*** This interview was conducted on March 12, 2020 and has been edited and truncated for brevity and clarity.