We were lucky to catch up with Queen Coke Francis recently and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Queen Coke, thanks for joining us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?

I’ll admit that I was really, REALLY lucky having the upbringing that I did. Not just having the privilege of living in a middle-class household in a safe neighborhood, but the fact that my parents have both always been very supportive of my passions and interests (as well as when I came out to them as bisexual when I was 13). The fact that they’re both creatives themselves factors into that, my mom is a writer and former chef and my dad is a voice actor and teacher. Both are entirely self-made.

I remember being in high school and dreaming of pursuing a career in filmmaking (which I sort of achieved… in a manner of speaking), and my dad told me “90% of people work at a job they hate. 9% work at a job they’re fine with. 1% work at a job they love. Always aim to be in that 1%.” So I took that advice and managed to get into film school at Chapman University, where I got a BFA in Film Production with a Directing emphasis. I found that I didn’t really like directing after all and found my footing more in post production and film editing, which are skills that have thankfully translated into content creation. Despite their support over the years, I still wasn’t entirely sure how they’d react to my full time job of playing dress-up and roasting people and media on the internet. But again, I got REALLY lucky. They regularly watch and enjoy my videos despite the homophobic/transphobic trolls in my comment sections assuming that my father never hugged me, etc. Sounds like projection to me.

That said, I want to use this section to give a shout-out to other queer content creators who DON’T have the support system I had, and still manage to find success, lead fulfilling lives, and be happy with themselves without compromising for anyone. I’m not sure that I would’ve been able to do the same, and it takes a tremendous amount of bravery to authentically be oneself, regardless of their upbringing. I know that I’m in the minority here and I will never take that for granted.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’ve had an interest in drag for a LONG time. Ever since my grandma showed me Rocky Horror Picture Show when I was like 6 years old. I even ended up making my senior thesis about drag queens when I went to film school. I had countless friends who did it themselves. So I’m not sure why it wasn’t until I had an epiphany during the COVID lockdown to finally try it myself. I spent the first year of the pandemic pretty much just staying in my room and experimenting with drag makeup.

Rewind to a few years prior, the summer after I graduated college (2017), I tried starting a Youtube channel under my real name, and I cringe into another oblivion every time I think about it. Because even though I was using my real name, I wasn’t actually being my real self. I didn’t ACTUALLY have an interest in telling people how to make a bullet journal or whatever, I was just trying what other creators were doing. It felt so inauthentic. So fake. I was still battling with major depressive disorder at the time as well, so I gave that up pretty quickly.

Out of all the effects the pandemic had on me, the most important one is that it forced me to reevaluate my priorities and what actually made me happy. The fact that “securing a legacy” as an artist didn’t actually matter. My relationships with my partner, family, and friends were what made me happy. My dumb hobbies were what made me happy. So about a year into the pandemic, the weird mishmash of ideas that had been cooking in my mind just kind of… came together. Both my development of my drag persona, and the fact that I wanted to give Youtube another shot with a different approach. I pitched the idea to my dear friend Mitchell Pratt, who’s become my channel co-producer and creates all the art and thumbnails you’ll see in my videos. And even though I look pretty much unrecognizable and go under a different name, I felt more authentically myself than ever.

So for over 3 years, I mostly stuck to talking about film and TV, pop culture icons, and queer culture (and politics, they love it when I talk about those). I developed a (very) small but devoted fanbase, which I’m still grateful for to this day. I tried to pick topics that hadn’t been covered, at least not to a great extent. (I’ve found that covering what’s most popular at the time is detrimental to my views, actually.) I was very aware that people ARE less likely to click on videos that don’t have many views or channels with very few subscribers, so I aimed to make the quality of my work speak for itself.

However… it took over 3 years of REALLY hard work on this channel for me to even begin to earn an income from it. Even to land this interview in the first place. There were plenty of times during those years where I contemplated quitting altogether. I got comments all the time being like “how do you only have 600 subscribers??” etc. It wasn’t until–out of ALL THINGS–I made a video ranking yaoi art made from the Daily Wire’s newest animated series, and for some reason that was the one that finally catapulted my channel to the success I had been trying to get for YEARS.

So I’m in kind of a weird transition phase right now as my channel continues to grow–which I’m extremely grateful for! I still talk about the aforementioned subjects, but I’ve been dipping my toes into new kinds of content, and I’ve started collaborating with other content creators. Regardless, I’m still known as–as my intros include–that “very tired drag queen talking about nerd sh*t forever.” And that’s what you can continue to expect!

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I’ve struggled with ADHD and major depressive disorder my entire life. This, as you can imagine, led to YEARS of crippling self-doubt, feelings of worthlessness and hopelessness, an obsession with perfectionism, and most of all, developing imposter syndrome.

Now, first and foremost, I have to credit my amazing therapist and the right combination of meds for doing the heavy lifting on getting me out of that state. Which are two resources that a lot of people don’t have access to, so I’m very lucky in that regard. I don’t want to treat this interview like another therapy session, so here’s a short list of things I had to learn/unlearn before having the guts to do what I currently do:

-When trying something new, don’t have the expectation of being “fearless,” because only sociopaths are fearless. You have to be BRAVE to try something new, because the fear you experience from it never actually goes away. So you have to allow your fear to come with you on your new journeys, but you have to tell it to sit down, shut up, and not look at the GPS.

-Imposter syndrome is a result of PROGRESS. When you hit new milestones and reach new levels of success, that success isn’t invalid, you’re just not used to feeling it because you never had before.

-Securing a “legacy” really doesn’t matter, in the grand scheme of the universe.

-Perfect is boring.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

From a drag point of view:

While I don’t doubt that the show has had a net positive effect on the drag community, (I actually made a whole video about this), I feel like RuPaul’s Drag Race has discouraged mainstream audiences from supporting local drag and lesser known performers. Drag is an art that’s a radical form of self expression, and it takes on every possible form. Which means it can scare away audiences who have only been exposed to the very specific pageantry seen on Drag Race–which is still beautiful and valid! Thankfully we have shows like Dragula that showcase alternative drag (and feature contestants of all genders, not just cisgender men). But for any drag/Drag Race fans reading this right now, please go out and support your local performers.

In general:

Pay artists for their work, “exposure” doesn’t help pay their bills or provide them with the resources to continue their craft.
Promote them on all forms of social media. Support local and independent art.
And for the love of god, please stop using AI slop to replace art created with real human expression.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/queencokefrancis
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@queencokefrancis
• Other: Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/QueenCokeFrancis
  TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@queencokefrancis

Image Credits

Main Photo: Bee Gutierrez

All Thumbnail Art: Mitchell Pratt