099 There's No Easy Road

Daydreamers! Today Charlie shares his conversation with actress Francis Benhamou. Francis has been carving out a career for over two decades, and most recently earned critical acclaim for her Lucille Lortel and Drama Desk award winning performance in Joshua Harmon's play A Prayer for the French Republic. Charlie and Francis discuss her four year journey with this play from a table read for the playwright, to making her Broadway debut playing Elodie Benhamou. So if you think the last name is a surprising coincidence, it's just the first of many unbelievable similarities to Francis' own life. This is a great conversation about the creative process, balancing career and family, and the profound impact a role can have on your life. You can follow CBP on Instagram @creatingbehavior, and Charlie's NYC acting conservatory, the Maggie Flanigan Studio @maggieflaniganstudio. Theme music by  https://www.thelawrencetrailer.com. To leave a voicemail on SpeakPipe, or contact Charlie for private coaching, check out https://www.creatingbehaviorpodcast.com and his NYC acting studio  https://www.maggieflaniganstudio.com.

Transcript

Charlie Sandlan:

So imagine this, you're a working actor, you've been at it for over two decades, you're seriously well-trained. I mean, you are an artist to your core. You have been working in New York theater, regional theater, you've been cobbling together a handful of television roles, some day players, under fives, a film role here and there. Nothing major, but you're working.

Life unfolds. You get married, you have a kid. And then all of a sudden this play lands in your lap. You're invited to do a stage reading. You read the play and you're going, "What the fuck? This is my life. This character has my same last name. It's got my same cultural background. The family dynamic and the issues are so similar to my life. Who wrote this?"

Well, we're going to talk to Francis Benhamou today. Francis is really an incredible actor, and we're going to talk about how A Prayer for the French Republic, Joshua Harmon's play, changed the course of her artistic life. It won her a Lucille Lortel Award, a Drama Desk Award, and it brought her to the Broadway stage playing Elodie in A Prayer for the French Republic. But I will tell you this, my friends, it has not been an easy road, and we're going to talk about that. So put the phone back in your pocket. Creating Behavior starts now.

Well, hello, my fellow daydreamers. I feel like this episode is a full circle episode, getting a chance to talk to Francis about A Prayer for the French Republic and her career. But go back and listen to episode 87. That's How am I Ever Going to Get There? Episode 87. And it's our studio talk that I shared with you with Joshua Harmon. Now, Joshua Harmon is the playwright of A Prayer for the French Republic. So it's really great to be able to hear him talk about his process, where the idea for this play comes from, and then now to be able to listen to Francis talk about how this came to her.

And I don't know, it's got a lot to do with fate and serendipity and being at the right place at the right time, but that must be something really fucking crazy to sit down and read this play. You get invited and asked to do a staged reading, table read of this play, and you're reading it, and the similarities are just absolutely freaky. She reads the part of Elodie Benhamou. Okay, so Francis Benhamou is reading about Elodie Benhamou. Francis, she's part Polish, she's Uruguayan, family is from Montevideo. She's Ashkenazi Jew, Polish Jew, she's got Russian in her, and her mom's a therapist. She reads the part. All of these things are part of this play, a part of this character's life tapestry. Okay?

So I would think you read and you just think, "Oh my God, this is amazing." And the next thing you know, four years later, you're on Broadway. And what's crazy, you didn't even have to audition for the play, didn't have to audition for the part. It all just unfolded in such an incredible way.

Now, it helps that Frances is an incredible actress. And the thing about this part, she's got a monologue in the second act of the play that's about 17 minutes long, 17 minutes. We're talking pages and pages and pages and pages of dialogue. It is, I think, the highlight of the show. It's a tour de force performance. And I sat there watching her and my jaw dropped. I couldn't believe it. The clarity with which she was able to lay out that monologue. The spontaneity, the surprise, the attention to detail, the arguments, because a lot of the monologue that she has is just loaded with political discourse.

So the passion, the clarity of the arguments that you have to have in order to pull this off, I mean, that's a hell of a lot of homework. And she did it. It was one of the best performances I've seen in a long time. And I actually emailed her and I told her, I said, "Listen, this is a Tony-nominated performance. This is incredible. Congratulations."

And there was no doubt in my mind and no doubt in just about everybody else's mind in her life that she was going to get nominated for a Tony. And I can only imagine, you start to think about those things when you think, "Wow, this is a real possibility." And then she didn't get a Tony nomination. It did not happen. And I will just say, completely fucking robbed. Okay, that was an outrageous snub, outrageous.

We're going to talk about all this today. Her relationship to the play, her relationship to success, to disappointment, to heartbreak, how it was for her to say goodbye to this character. You spend so much time with her only to have to really kind of put it to bed. She'll never play Elodie again. She's past that age bracket where she could pull it off believably, really. So it's an interesting conversation.

And also what I find just inspiring is the fact that she's been able to live just a really full rich life, and not sacrifice the pursuit of her art. She's got an incredible daughter, she's married. She's living the life that she wanted to create for herself. And I think for any artist, that's the goal, that's the aspiration. But as I said in the open, there's no easy road for that to happen. It takes a lot of sacrifice, and man, a lot of passion to not quit, to not give up on yourself or to not go do something else in order to maybe provide more security for your family, and all these things that you think about and grapple with as you go through life.

We're going to talk about her theater career. She was doing a play, Selling Kabul, while she was rehearsing A Prayer for the French Republic. So she would be rehearsing A Prayer for the French Republic during the day, and then she would have to go and do Selling Kabul at Playwrights Horizons, a really intense, fantastic play by Sylvia Khoury. The play is really about this interpreter in Afghanistan who has to make a decision about, do I stay in hiding because I'm being hunted by the Taliban, or do I try to get to my wife for the birth of our child?

Francis plays Leyla in the play. She's got some very, very, very intense, emotionally traumatic material to mine. So she's in rehearsal all day, and then she has to go at night and live through some serious emotional trauma. And then go home, sleep, get up at the crack of dawn so you can spend some time with your child, only to go to rehearsal and then go and do the show. Talk about intense. How do you do that? That's the life of an actor, and it's inspirational to me. And it was inspirational listening to it, and I hope it is for you too.

So let's just get right to it. At the top of the conversation, I just asked her how you got to New York? Did you move to New York to pursue your acting? And we'll just take it from there. Here is my conversation with Francis Benhamou.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yes, I moved to New York to be an actor, but I did it in a very sort of roundabout way. I didn't have the confidence to say, "I'm moving to New York to be an actor," even though it was the unconscious drive. But I went to NYU for psychology. So I majored in psychology at NYU. And I think what it was was I was scared to audition for NYU because I had auditioned at an art school in Miami at New World for high school, and I got rejected.

Charlie Sandlan:

Well, that'll do it. So the wound was early on.

 Francis Benhamou:

Exactly. Even though I would've rejected me too, so I'm not sure...

Charlie Sandlan:

Why would you have rejected you?

 Francis Benhamou:

I went in there really kind of like, I don't know, I'm just doing this because everyone says I should. And it wasn't coming from me. And it was because I was always scared to really confront things and own them and make it mine. So looking back, if I were one of the people on the panel that were watching, I would be like, "No, this girl's not fighting for herself."

Charlie Sandlan:

So you go to NYU, you get your degree, and then what, you just thought, maybe?

 Francis Benhamou:

The whole time, I did a concentration in acting. So that meant that every semester I had an acting class, whether it was through the School of Education, it was all elective classes. And I studied with a bunch of teachers that were either adjunct. Which all kind of stood out to me. I still remember them weirdly enough. In fact, a couple people from NYU from those classes came to see Prayer for the French Republic on Broadway, and they were like, "I don't know if you remember me, but we were in class together." So that was cool.

Charlie Sandlan:

That's special.

 Francis Benhamou:

I was like, okay, I'm going to study psychology, which was super interesting too.

Charlie Sandlan:

It's a thin line between psychology and acting.

 Francis Benhamou:

Oh, yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

It's all in there together.

 Francis Benhamou:

And I grew up in a home with... My mother's a psychologist, so we were always breaking down characters, personalities, things like that.

When I graduated, I started working in research studies, and I do really appreciate the things I got out of that because I worked in a juvenile detention in Florida, worked in a rehab in Florida. And we're talking about over town, really hardcore Miami sort of institutions. And I was very young. I was 19 years old. So I feel like-

Charlie Sandlan:

What did that do just in terms of how you started to see the world? A lot of people don't have access to that kind of real life shit.

 Francis Benhamou:

Which is why I'm so thankful for it. Because I feel like a lot of times I see actors coming out of conservatories and they're so sheltered. I don't really see them having lived any sort of life experience or gone through anything that really kind of exposed them to what's going on in the world. It was a very rich experience on many different levels, seeing different socio-economic classes. My family was always kind of a middle, lower class family. These were stories that I was not familiar with. It wasn't in my world.

And I was fascinated. That's the thing. I really was completely engulfed in wanting to know more about these kids and connecting to them. In fact, I connected to them so much that a lot of times the companies I worked for were like, "Yeah, you can't be so involved with that. You need to be a neutral." And I'm like, "Right, right. I'm doing a research study."

Charlie Sandlan:

Did you ever consider just going into social work or that kind of field, or were you like, "You know what, this was good enough."

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. So what happened was when I worked in New York, I came to New York and I did another research study that was with women who were HIV positive, and a lot of them were recovering drug addicts. And I was doing intake with them, and they were tests that took two and a half hours. And interviewing a woman who's on methadone for two and a half hours is quite a challenge, keeping them awake. And their very personal kind of intense question. And after a while, I think what got me was that I started to get desensitized to their experiences because it became so clinical. And I just felt like I didn't like who it was making me become. I was losing the heart.

Charlie Sandlan:

I would think that's probably how people even survive in that profession. You have to desensitize or you won't make it, you will quit. I mean, that's why it's such a burnout rate, social work.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. And even in the medical field, I mean, I felt that way when I gave birth and the nurses looked at me like I was... They didn't give a shit. It's just a machine and they don't get paid enough.

Charlie Sandlan:

How did you get into The Studio and start training with Maggie?

 Francis Benhamou:

So basically, I finally had a come to Jesus moment where I was like, why am I here? At this point I had just graduated college. I was a year doing the research studies, and I was really unhappy. And I said, "Well, it's now or never. I'm still young enough to go after it, so let's..." I'm going to start waiting tables, figure out how. I've never done it before. So basically trained and not get hired at four places, cry every night because I can't even figure it out. But that's kind of how I learned, by not getting hired. And eventually I got a job. And I started also working for an extras casting agent, helping her with that. And then she would sometimes cast these little films, these indie films, which I was calling big agents and doing all that. And looking back, I auditioned a lot of very successful actors now. I mean, it's shocking.

Charlie Sandlan:

Right, before they were successful.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

Yeah, right.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. I was like 21 years old. It was a long time ago. So I was doing that, waiting tables, and then I started working for this manager. And she didn't pay me. I just wanted a way in. So she recommended... So I'd be like, "I really just wish you could give me an opportunity."

She's like, "Well, honey, have you studied?"

And I was like, "Well, I minored in it at NYU."

And she's like, "Well, no, you need more experience."

And I was like, "Okay, I'll do whatever you say."

So she had heard about Maggie and she recommended her. And I remember walking into her office, and I immediately felt like... I was immediately drawn to her. I just felt like, first of all, who's this little classy lady?

Charlie Sandlan:

Chanel suit and Valentino slips.

 Francis Benhamou:

And just that demure sort of seriousness, but boundaries. And I just thought she was beautiful, and was really listening to me when I spoke in a way that I felt like people weren't doing. I think she saw how much I wanted to do this. And I started the two-year program. So I think it was 2004. So I think I was 24 years old.

Charlie Sandlan:

So now having a 20-year career, what did that work do for you? What kind of foundation does it lay for you, and how does it affect how you still work?

 Francis Benhamou:

It's still a part of my process. I mean, what I learned at Maggie's Studio was something I hadn't learned anywhere else, which some of the big things were big life things, of course, and also just the experience of how much you need to create your imaginary world, how much you need to be in your fantasy and your creative... How do things make you feel and that sort of thing, which you just don't hear that much about that out in the regular sort of school world of acting. It's so technical. I felt that she brought this aspect that was so personal and so raw. And recently I was doing a play at Playwrights Horizon called Selling Kabul, and that was-

Charlie Sandlan:

Disturbing, disturbing play.

 Francis Benhamou:

It was one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. Because every single night I had to experience betraying my best friend, my husband getting abducted by the Taliban, and my child as well, and then my husband dying. And it was sometimes two shows a day. And I remember thinking, because when we talk about, you asked me was I surprised about getting nominated for A Prayer for the French Republic. Selling Kabul was so much harder, and it took so much more work. And I was really proud of myself because I wasn't sure I'd be able to get there every day, every night, every show.

And I learned something based on stuff that I learned from Maggie, which is if in your fantasies, the more specific you are, it doesn't matter that you have to do it every day if you create a new story for yourself every day. And it worked. I remember being like, oh, it does work because I'm doing it. And it's killing me, I'm destroyed, but I rather do that than... There's no way I'm phoning this in. There's no way I'm faking this. This has to be real. And it was just surprising how well it worked. Because you do the work and then you have to let it go, and then you have to see if it works, and it never failed. And that was a huge gift.

Charlie Sandlan:

Well, how did you navigate just taking care of yourself? Because the self-care is very important. And how did you navigate eight shows a week?

 Francis Benhamou:

It was really hard. On top of that, I was also rehearsing for A Prayer for the French Republic during the day, and I had a kid.

Charlie Sandlan:

Yeah, all right, so you're in rehearsal, what, five, six hours during the day?

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

And then you go to that show and then you got to go home and you got to take care of your child?

 Francis Benhamou:

Well, I have to wake up in the morning because she'd be asleep by the time I got home. But I'd have to, no matter what, wake up at 6:30 in the morning to be with her because it was the only time I had with her. It was definitely one of the hardest moments of my life for sure. And my husband said that I was definitely on edge. Also, the roles, I think we take them home with us. I went to get a massage and the woman asked me if I was going through some extreme trauma in my life.

Charlie Sandlan:

Yeah, every night.

 Francis Benhamou:

I was like, "Well, since you're asking."

Charlie Sandlan:

Well, because the nervous system doesn't know the difference between fantasy and reality. So your body is going through it.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. And thankfully, my co-star was in the room with me. It was a small cast, four people, and I was on one side of a curtain and he was on the other. We would always be in the room at the same time when we were preparing for some very intense scenes because he had some too. And his energy was so incredible because he was such an amazing actor. And it was so helpful for me to feel the seriousness of another actor through a curtain. We all feel each other. Same nervous system. So I was very proud of that show and what we did. And I don't think that many people saw it.

Charlie Sandlan:

Yeah, I mean, Playwrights Horizons, you have to know about it, and you have to be a theater junkie, and you have to who want to see... Because that's where the best theater is. It's not always on Broadway.

 Francis Benhamou:

I know, I know. And people aren't all running to see stories about Afghanistan.

Charlie Sandlan:

Right. Well, I mean, you've done two plays that are very potent politically.

 Francis Benhamou:

I know, yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

Challenging. I'm curious, when you were 23, 24 and you get out of school, you have this vision of what your career is going to be, or you have this idea, and then you have the career you have. And you're doing it, you've done it, you have career, which is like threading the needle, really.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

What's different about the reality versus the idea you had when you got out of school?

 Francis Benhamou:

I didn't think it would take this long.

Charlie Sandlan:

A couple decades.

 Francis Benhamou:

Which is why I'm still like, "Am I doing it? I'm not sure." Listen, I'm glad because I feel like because I didn't make it as young, I grew so much because of it. It forced me to really hone the craft and work on it and actually do it for the right reasons. I think when you're young, it's really easy to get caught up in all the wrong reasons that you want to do something.

And there's a lot of alluring things about being an actor and being successful that aren't necessarily fulfilling in the end. And I think the reason I'm still here is because I truly love doing it. It's the actual act of doing the work is what makes me happy more than the recognition of it. And obviously being able to support myself doing it, that's the goal for me, not so much the recognition of it.

Obviously it's so beautiful to engage with people who appreciate your work. But the thing that most makes me happy and feel fulfilled is that I can do that instead of having to have another job to make money. Because what you're actually doing is your life, and your day-to-day, and what is bringing you joy.

So, yeah, I love getting in a rehearsal room. It's my favorite thing in the world. I love reading people's work and connecting and talking about it and analyzing it. That's my favorite thing to do.

Charlie Sandlan:

So when you get a script, take me through your process. How do you approach a piece of material for the first time?

 Francis Benhamou:

I get very excited. I sit down, have a cup of coffee or whatever, it depends what time it is, and I start to read. If I'm offered a role or if I'm auditioning for a role, whenever that role comes up, I always read that role out loud. I have to read it out loud. I have to hear it in my body and see how it makes me feel to say the words.

Charlie Sandlan:

So literally as you're reading through the script, when you get to your parts, you'll say those out loud as you read them.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

Now, do you act it, or is it just, I just want to read it and hear it, or you let your instincts take you or whatever?

 Francis Benhamou:

I let my instincts, because I don't know what's happening. Sometimes I'm not acting because I don't know what's coming, but I experience as I start to know what's coming, I just let whatever I feel come in.

Charlie Sandlan:

So these are your first associations, your very first instincts, the absolute first time through.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

Oh, this is interesting.

 Francis Benhamou:

And I know that a play is really good for me and good in general if what I'm associating starts to groove so well that I'm so in it, that all the things that I feel start to match up with what's coming. When I start to feel like I don't understand how I got here, that to me is a little bit of a red flag of like, okay, well, I always assume that it could be the state that I'm in today. But when I read Prayer for the French Republic, there was no question from the first read that this-

Charlie Sandlan:

It was too serendipitous. I mean, you just freak the fuck out a little bit at all these things that line up and your surname and the Jewish history and your family and where you grew up and your grandma.

 Francis Benhamou:

It was wild. I mean, right away I thought there was a mistake, like a misprint, like my [inaudible 00:25:59] worked on everybody's character name. I was like, oh, they made a mistake. My name was always like, "How do you spell your name?" "Ben, Ham, Ou." Nobody got it. No one knew. "Where are you from?" This guy knows.

Charlie Sandlan:

So, all right, let's look at that one. So you're reading A Prayer for the French Republic the first time, and you hit the monologue. As you were reading that out loud for the first time, are you just thinking to yourself, "What the fuck? This is epic."

 Francis Benhamou:

This is epic, and whoever ends up doing this, holy shit. That's what I thought.

Charlie Sandlan:

It reminded me of that Louis monologue in Angels in America that's just so epic as well. But I mean, what does it clock in, about 17, 18 minutes this monologue?

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah, the whole scene does, which, because there's some back and forth, but yeah, it's about that. It's mostly her talking.

Charlie Sandlan:

What was going through your mind when you were reading it through for the first time?

 Francis Benhamou:

Who is this genius? Because I hadn't heard of him because I wasn't very well-read in that world. And this is amazing. This is written in a way that every actor wants to speak. I just felt, forget even the content, the way this man writes, you don't have to work that hard to say the words. They're there. He has all the breaths and the moments that it's like as if he was writing it out loud. I was amazed. And such brilliant thoughts, such interesting complex ideas, but yet made so simple.

Charlie Sandlan:

So you first got the script, I guess, to do a staged reading or just to hear it in the room for him?

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah, they just wanted to read it. There was no director. It was just the playwright and Manhattan Theater Club.

Charlie Sandlan:

It had to be a lot longer than three hours, that first read, or was it close to what it was?

 Francis Benhamou:

No, it might've been a little longer. We did read it really fast and he tried not to read too many stage directions. But honestly, there was no rehearsal. They just threw us in the room and they said, "Look, you may have read it a week before by yourselves, but we just want to hear it out loud."

Charlie Sandlan:

Michael Stuhlbarg was there. Was he in the reading or was he watching?

 Francis Benhamou:

He was in the reading. He was reading the part of my uncle.

Charlie Sandlan:

He's a great actor.

 Francis Benhamou:

Amazing,

Charlie Sandlan:

Amazing,

 Francis Benhamou:

Amazing. So he was there, and I remember he really stood out to me.

I just felt like I was living in some sort of dream. I didn't understand how I ended up there. And I was like, okay, I'm just going to focus and read this thing that I know is beautiful, and let the words do the magic. I don't even do anything. I just need to not get in the way. Let me just read this. And that was it. It was immediately... Everybody that was watching was in full tears at the end. It was so moving.

Charlie Sandlan:

And so you know this is something, I hold onto this. I have to hold onto Elodie with all my claws. Dig in.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah, dig in. But also always with a soft grip, because you don't want to scare people and you also don't want to set yourself up to be [inaudible 00:29:17].

Charlie Sandlan:

Did you ever have to really fight for it or was it yours, own?

 Francis Benhamou:

In my mind, I had already at this point in my life, experienced so much disappointment. I really felt like this was such a beautiful thing that I didn't care how... It just needed to get made, and whatever happened to it, I just wanted the best for it. Obviously I wanted to be in it, but I didn't ever think that I actually had a chance. Because it started off, it was so powerful so right away that I was like, they're going to give this to a star. This is a beautiful role. And what happened was that they kept asking me to do readings. And each time I think that they just saw how much more, like me, how connected I was to it. I never told them anything about how similar to me it was.

Charlie Sandlan:

Now see, that I think takes some restraint and some maturity almost, because that seems to me what most people would... Just, I want to vomit that up right away. "Just so you know."

 Francis Benhamou:

Exactly. But this is one of the things that I've learned doing this for so long that not everything's about you, everybody's in their head about their own stuff. And I think the smartest thing to do is to sit back and watch and take it all in and know when it is about you. And it wasn't the time. And I felt that even after... I didn't tell Josh about the similarities until maybe the fourth read. I had already done... And then finally he was next to me on one of the reads, and I said, "You know, my mom's a therapist." He was already like, "Your name is Benhamou."

And I was like, "Same. My mom's Ashkenazi. My dad's Sephardic." So then my mom's a therapist came a little later and he was like, "Wait, what?"

"Yeah. And I studied abroad in Paris when I was 20. I turned 21 in Paris."

And so he started little by little being like, "This is crazy. This is crazy."

And I'm like, "No, I know. I know. It's crazy."

Charlie Sandlan:

Right. To conjure up a character in your mind and then have an actor come in who has all of these parallel connections, that's really freaky.

 Francis Benhamou:

But Josh is very private and he has a lot of boundaries, and I saw that right away. So I was always very respectful of that. So I didn't want to scare him away either. So I felt like, let me just sit back. And now we're super close. I mean, we're really good friends. At first, I knew that he was someone you don't want to just... It's like a dog that you want to just wait until they come to you. And I did that with him.

Charlie Sandlan:

And so what happened? They said, "Listen, we want you to do it. We are doing it Off-Broadway

 Francis Benhamou:

So then Cromer got attached, and then Cromer did a read. And then after that-

Charlie Sandlan:

Did you feel pressure there? Like, "Oh fuck, here's David Cromer, and now I've got to really step up to another."

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. Well, the funny thing about me is I'm really bad with stuff because I could never afford to go to the theater or anything. And so my husband, he's an actor as well, when I told him Cromer was directing, he was like, "What?"

And I was like, "Wait, what?" I didn't even-

Charlie Sandlan:

Oh, you didn't know? Yeah, right. Okay. Well, so then you knew.

 Francis Benhamou:

Then I knew. And my husband has very high standard of taste, in my opinion. And so when I saw him get all, I was like, "Oh, shit, this means something. This is important. I believe him."

So he's like, "Fran, this is a really big deal and this is amazing."

Charlie Sandlan:

Was there talk that, listen, our hope is to get it to Broadway, or this was just a commissioned play?

 Francis Benhamou:

Well, this is all still while it was Off-Broadway.

Charlie Sandlan:

Manhattan Theatre Club.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

Which in and of itself, even if that was as far as it went, is a great stepping stone.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. I had auditioned for them before, but Kelly Gillespie was like... I said to her, "Thank you so much for thinking of me."

She was like, "How could I not? It's your last name. That's actually how I thought of you."

Charlie Sandlan:

Now, did you have to audition?

 Francis Benhamou:

No. So then what happened was I did it with Cromer. And then in the middle of the pandemic, I just got a call, "Hey, I want to offer you the role of Elodie."

And I was like, "Wait, what?" I mean what a bright light in the middle of such a dark moment?

Charlie Sandlan:

A hundred percent. So the first time you got the play and read the play was when?

 Francis Benhamou:

Oh my God, five years ago.

Charlie Sandlan:

So 2019.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

Right before the pandemic.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

And then the pandemic happens and everything gets delayed.

 Francis Benhamou:

Everything gets delayed. I was starting Selling Kabul when the pandemic happened. And then I have to do Selling Kabul when we come back. When are you guys doing this? They already have the set-up. We were very connected and I didn't want to drop out of that. And they were like, "No, we're shooting for when you're done with that."

I'm like, "Great." And it happened.

Charlie Sandlan:

How many people were involved from the beginning, any of the cast?

 Francis Benhamou:

I would say Peyton who played the young boy Off-Broadway, but then he got too old to play it on Broadway because he was young. So him and I were the only ones. Rich Topol came soon after my first reading, so he was pretty much from the beginning. So he did it Off-Broadway. But that was it. Everyone kept changing.

Charlie Sandlan:

So then when did the Broadway talk start?

 Francis Benhamou:

So that talk I never was privy to. It came out of nowhere. We finished the show. A year and a half later, I get a phone call from my agents. They're all on the phone, which never happens. My managers and my agent, out of nowhere. No one had talked to me previously. There were no-

Charlie Sandlan:

So as far as you were concerned, that baby was done, in the can, onto something else.

 Francis Benhamou:

And out of nowhere, "Are you ready to be on Broadway?"

And I was like, "I haven't auditioned for any Broadway shows." I have no idea what they're talking about. I still didn't think of Prayer. It was done. It had been over a year. It had been like a year and a half.

They're like, A Prayer for the French Republic is going Broadway, and they want you to go with it. I happened to be with my whole family. My parents were visiting. It was beautiful.

Charlie Sandlan:

Is that the best moment you've had in your career, that call?

 Francis Benhamou:

I mean, honestly, being offered it the first time Off-Broadway in the middle of pandemic, that was pretty glorious. Also just that someone in the world was hopeful that we were going to come out of this, they were planning a production. It was a dark time.

Charlie Sandlan:

Well, how did you guys do? I mean, actors, artists, the creative folk really, really, really really struggled. And then there's a strike after. I mean, the strike comes. It's just been one long struggle.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. Yeah, it was a struggle. It was a struggle. It really affected my life in terms of also just personally. We were like, yeah, are we going to have another child or not? I was already at that age where I couldn't really wait anymore. And that really messed up a lot of stuff, which in the end, I think everything happens for a reason. I know that's a big cliche, but I'm very happy, and it is what it is. But it did affect my life, of course.

Charlie Sandlan:

So every actor dreams about Broadway. It's that myth. It's that thing off in the distance. Is the dream better than the reality or are they in the same?

 Francis Benhamou:

I think the reality is more grounded and it's actually more beautiful because you realize that the dream is kind of an illusion. And then the doing it is real life. And to me, nothing is more powerful or beautiful than real life. But however you imagine something or however dreamy something is, it's not real. So I think the reality of it was even better than the dream of it. Because first of all, there's no difference between Broadway and Off-Broadway in terms of the reality of what you're doing.

Charlie Sandlan:

The actual job itself and showing up to the theater and rehearsal and the creative process of it.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah, no different.

Charlie Sandlan:

So what's different? Just the idea that you're on a Broadway fucking stage?

 Francis Benhamou:

How other people feel about it. It's not really how I felt about it. Off-Broadway, that show meant just as much to me. The theater I was in was gorgeous, and beautiful surroundings. Yes, it was beautiful to stand on that stage and look at how gorgeous. Yes, I love beautiful things. In that sense, things like that. And the fact that people knew about it, more people knew about it because it was on Broadway. I had people reach out to me, and people saw the play that I know wouldn't have seen it if it was just Off-Broadway. People that don't usually go to the theater, were seeing it. So there's more of a bigger audience that you're getting to.

Charlie Sandlan:

Well, I mean, I got your email after I saw the play. I had to reach out to you because it was an extraordinary performance and it blew me away. And I just thought what you did was absolutely worthy of a Tony, at least a Tony nomination. And it didn't happen. I know we spoke about it before we started recording, but when you start to get buzz and you win a Lucille Lortel Award and you win a Drama Desk Award and you're on Broadway, do you start thinking about those things? Or were you just like, "Ah, that's..."

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. I mean the people around you kind of need to think about it. Your team, your managers, your agents will say things like, "I think you need a publicist, and this could be a big thing." So I had a publicist.

Charlie Sandlan:

You did? First time?

 Francis Benhamou:

First time, yeah.

Charlie Sandlan:

That was the time to do it.

 Francis Benhamou:

So even when your publicist is saying, "You will be nominated. You're on every prediction list, so let's just plan accordingly." I happened to have been in LA at the time, and I had to wake up super early. You have to be ready for that first phone call.

Charlie Sandlan:

Oh my God.

 Francis Benhamou:

So I had to wake myself early at 6:00 in the morning, have a coffee. My daughter's in the hotel room with me and my husband, and we're all waiting, and then my name doesn't show up, and I'm just like okay.

Charlie Sandlan:

So what's your team say after that? What's the fallout? I mean, it must have been devastating, devastating for you. You're devastated. Of course.

 Francis Benhamou:

I mean, we were all broken... And for me, what was hard about it was like I didn't want everyone to feel so bad for me. I think that that was the hardest part, getting over every phone call of everyone being... Everyone just thought it was going to happen.

Charlie Sandlan:

Of course.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. So that was hard. But beautiful things came out of it.

Charlie Sandlan:

Like what? What are the beautiful things that came out?

 Francis Benhamou:

Just the way that... Josh sends me. He's like, "Did you see what David Adjmi said about you in his interview?"

And I was like, "What?"

He's like sending me the link. And then Alaine Alldaffer at Playwrights Horizons who cast Stereophonic is writing, "She got robbed." Things like that. Those are incredible gifts that people were giving me. And I wasn't unaware. And that was wow. To me, that was bigger than a nomination, to have people in my world, my colleagues. The people saying, "You deserved this nomination that you didn't get," was incredibly moving.

Charlie Sandlan:

Yeah, yeah, I can understand that. But that still hurts the heart, I'm assuming.

 Francis Benhamou:

I was sad. I was very sad. My daughter said to me, "You cried 13 times today, Ma."

You know what I felt? I felt like the feeling of having been cheated on. That's what it felt like.

Charlie Sandlan:

A betrayal.

 Francis Benhamou:

It felt like a strong... In my body, that's exactly what it felt like, that sadness, that deep betrayal. And what I didn't realize, I hadn't fully said bye to Elodie the character. And I was having to also simultaneously say goodbye. Because when you're nominated, you don't say goodbye, you got to keep bringing her up and talking about her and keeping her alive. And so I wasn't ready for that. I didn't know I had to say goodbye that soon. I thought I had a whole few months of celebrating her now.

Charlie Sandlan:

What's that like to part from a character in that way? What's the journey of that? I don't think a lot of people understand that that is a real thing, especially when you've had that kind of a journey.

 Francis Benhamou:

It's like saying bye to a family member that you love dearly who's died. Because at this point in my life, I'll never play her again. It's over. And I loved her so much. I loved her so much.

My daughter's like a really intuitive sort of empath, and she asked me, one day out of nowhere, she was like, "Do you miss Elodie?" Because she saw the play twice, six years old. I was like, "Wow, she gets it."

I don't feel like this about every character. I was very happy to let you know Leyla from Selling Kabul go, it was too painful. But I think Elodie is a part of me and she's a part of me that she lets herself act in ways that I don't in life. So it was very freeing. And it felt really liberating for me. It's very liberating to play roles that allow you to show parts of your temperament that you don't allow in life because they might be inappropriate or too much. So I tend to sometimes be a little too much. So being able to do that for a role and then being recognized for that is beautiful.

Charlie Sandlan:

Most people when they talk about that part and the monologue, they just get caught up in the memorization, like the memorization is the important thing. And that's not the thing. Making sense of the arguments, making sense of the points and finding the spontaneity and also the opinion to link everything together. How did you actually craft it out?

 Francis Benhamou:

That's so fun.

Charlie Sandlan:

Isn't it? It really is.

 Francis Benhamou:

It's the most fun. Yeah. And the best part is it changes. Because it's like anything, you can look at it a million different ways, the same thing. So then the next thought is affected by the previous thought, and that changes too. So it was never exactly the same. And in fact, when it was the same, I would get bored. And so I would have to go back and be like, "What else could this be?" And I would be fascinated at how many interpretations, the same line, would have.

Charlie Sandlan:

A slight point of view, a different point of view about what you're saying, or the argument changes a little bit, or the point you're trying to make.

 Francis Benhamou:

Doing that, what was interesting about that is it was scary because on those days I was also more prone to forget the line. Because if I had a new connection to it, I wasn't depending on the rote sort of, oh, well, I know what comes next, because it was affecting me differently. So then I'd be like, "Where am I? I forgot where I am." It would kind of throw me off. So at times I was like, "I'm scared to do that. I'm scared to keep working on it because I'm scared to forget where I am." But that also became a thrill because the person could forget where they are.

She's talking a lot. And I did have... Did that happen on Broadway or Off-Broadway? I forgot where I was. And I had to figure out how to get back and I had to improv. Those moments, they're quite scary, but they're also incredible when you don't let yourself down and your focus is so strong that you find your way back and stay in character. You'll never feel as strong. If you don't have those moments, you won't know how strong you actually are and how you can do it.

Charlie Sandlan:

The play actually happened before October 7th, but yet it's happening on the backdrop of October 7th as you go into the Broadway run. So after doing the play and taking on her point of view about things, have you changed your view about anything? Have you been affected in that way?

 Francis Benhamou:

I was already affected before October 7th. I had already felt like... I really dive into the history of every character I play. I get really into... I like understanding the culture, the world that I am living in. I love reading and learning, so I do it with any play I do. So even though this character had similar background to me, I wasn't as involved in my own culture the way that Elodie was. So I did have to learn. What was interesting about this is that I ended up actually learning about my own history through this character, that I hadn't chosen to do myself.

Charlie Sandlan:

You probably a lot of deep conversations with your family, and I know your mom was impacted by it.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yes, yes. Very deep, mind-blowingly. Things that I just would have never brought up with her that the play made me bring up. And it did kind of affect how I felt about certain political views and really getting into the history of my family and understanding and reading. And it did, it affected me.

And then of course, October 7th happened and I just couldn't believe the timing for me of all of it. I'm saying for me, obviously this is a way bigger thing to the whole world, but as an artist, this particular project and how things were unfolding, it was really tricky. It was tricky and it was complicated, but very deepening in terms of my own personal relationship with the whole Israel thing.

Charlie Sandlan:

I'm sure you knew things about your family and your grandparents and their struggle and things that maybe you didn't know before the play or would never even thought to probe.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah, well more than anything I learned... I always knew the stuff about my grandparents. They left Europe right before the Holocaust, so that was always something that my grandma lived with. She lost her whole family. So it's something that was always in kind of our DNA. We knew. We felt it. We knew where she was coming from.

But my mother was always kind of, she didn't associate so much with any kind of group in general. She tended to keep away from that. But what this brought up was me asking her specifically... I never asked her why she was so the way she was. And I said, "Did you experience anti-Semitism growing up in Uruguay?"

And she looked at me and she's like, "So much." And then everything started to make sense. So many things that she just never talked about started to make sense. And my mom's very open. She talks about everything and she's a psychologist and she's really into... Friends and partners that I've had in the past are always like, "You guys talk about everything. It's kind of weird how much you guys talk about everything."

But this was something that she never talked about. It opened up a lot for her. This play changed her.

Charlie Sandlan:

Has your career started to change? You see a shift in how things come to you and auditions and opportunities?

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. What's interesting is you do this really big role on Broadway and you do all this amazing sort of work, and then now I get to do really small roles in big things, and that's something I didn't have access to before. So I'm learning a whole new set of things, which I find very helpful and I'm really actually enjoying learning. There's so much psychology in all of this. And playing a small role in working with really big names and knowing how to be on a set like that, is its own.

Charlie Sandlan:

So what have you learned about being on a set?

 Francis Benhamou:

Well, same as what I felt with Josh, which is you kind of have to let everything happen. Even more so when you're playing a small role, you need to know... I couldn't stress this more to anyone, and we've all heard this, it is not about you, nothing's about you, everyone has a million things on their mind. And if you lead with that, it'll calm you down. It'll make everyone around you think you're cool and chill. Go on the set and watch. Just see how everyone... Because stars tend to direct themselves, they direct the director. So it's a whole new world to me from normally when I've worked, I always work with people who are at the same level as me. So there is not that added thing, that added element, which right now I'm like, oh, this is something, this is interesting.

Charlie Sandlan:

Do you find yourself pushing too much after doing so much theater? Or do you have to adjust? Or do you feel like, nah, I know the difference and I'll tone it down?

 Francis Benhamou:

I think I've been learning that through my tapes. Since I did mostly theater, I would see myself after I did a tape and I'd be like, "Oh God, I'm making a lot of faces. This is a lot."

So I have learned how to kind of just feel it and not have to feel like I have to show it. So there's difference there. Not that when I'm doing theater, I feel like I have to show it, but you have a bigger canvas. There's more space. And now even with a tape, I think about something like this, something my husband taught me because he does a lot of TV, is don't look past the corners of the screen.

Charlie Sandlan:

That's a good one.

 Francis Benhamou:

If you're over here, it just looks like you're lost. So I learned that through tape. So tapes have actually been very useful for getting on a set for me because I'm starting to understand how that works. It's very different. I prefer theater. It's religious for me, it's spiritual. It's like ah. I love being in a room where no one's on their phone and the energy of that.

Charlie Sandlan:

And just to be able to live through something, you just really don't in film and TV. It's like these two minute, three minute clips.

 Francis Benhamou:

I know. And it's exhausting to just keep doing the same... It's a weird, stunted...

Charlie Sandlan:

Take the money though.

 Francis Benhamou:

Exactly, exactly.

Charlie Sandlan:

Did you ever have a moment where you were like, "I quit, this is just not going to go anywhere for me."

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Probably more than one.

Charlie Sandlan:

But yet you didn't, so what were you clinging to? Just the fact that I can't live without it, [inaudible 00:54:43]?

 Francis Benhamou:

I think the hardest part was just paying the bills and just feeling really defeated by that, and working so hard and waiting tables for so many years is exhausting.

Charlie Sandlan:

That's what I tell my students, that there are two things that will kill you, that will cause you to quit, and one is not being able to financially support yourself and pursue your art, and the second is to not be able to handle rejection.

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah, those are high up there. The rejection I was pretty good at. I think it was that first, not getting into art school in high school. I think I got that one. But I think as I was getting older and I was on my feet, I was in literal pain from it.

Charlie Sandlan:

It was soul-sucking. Waiting tables, bartending, it does, it crushes you.

 Francis Benhamou:

It's exhausting. And I learned a lot from it and I liked it when I was young. It's not that I didn't get anything from it. The amount that you learn about multitasking, especially if you work at really busy places, and it's like all those things made me who I am and I really value those things. I look at the world and I see people who don't have those experiences and I don't think they're as rich in their work. So I appreciate it.

Charlie Sandlan:

Were you worried that having a kid was going to change your career or sabotage it or end it?

 Francis Benhamou:

I mean, honestly, since I didn't have much of one, I didn't think it would. And since I've had her, my career has only gotten better.

Charlie Sandlan:

So listen, it's amazing. You have a family, you have a daughter, you have a career, you're in every bucket. And so many people say, "Well, it's got to be one or the other. If you have a kid, fuck it, forget it. Not going to happen for you." But it's not true.

 Francis Benhamou:

No, it's not true.

Charlie Sandlan:

I mean, you can carve out anything you want. And you just never know where things are going to lead. You get called for that reading.

 Francis Benhamou:

I think if you do things for the right reasons, which everything has to come from the right place. Love. And it can't be in your ego. It has to be in a collaborative, the joy of what you're doing. And if it comes from there, I really think that wherever it goes, it's got to be a good place.

Charlie Sandlan:

What do you love about acting?

 Francis Benhamou:

It feels like never growing up. The difference in my brain to the brain of a person who has a job that's just to make money and to have the family and to have those things, and I feel like my brain has developed differently because of it. There's a sense of playfulness in life that I have that I'm so thankful for, that I actually think it's important to be present every day. And the reason I'm like that in life is because I learned it through my job. And they're so enmeshed to me that I don't know what I would do if I... What I love about acting is that it keeps me alive. I can't live without it. And I want to share stories, I want to write. I want to be part always of the collaboration of that creation of that sort of brain that is constantly evolving and growing and loving.

Charlie Sandlan:

How about the importance of listening?

 Francis Benhamou:

That's everything. And I thanked Molly Ranson every night during that monologue.

Charlie Sandlan:

Yeah, she really gave you a lot there.

 Francis Benhamou:

I mean, if someone's not listening, I can't do it. And she listened. We were communicating that whole time because she was listening.

Charlie Sandlan:

How can you tell when another actor's not listening to you?

 Francis Benhamou:

I mean, you could tell. When they're not being affected by what you're saying.

Charlie Sandlan:

They're just like a monolith, a stone. It's going in one ear and out the other. That's really frustrating, right?

 Francis Benhamou:

Yeah. It's so frustrating. And I definitely got myself in trouble when I was younger. I remember I was doing this film and I had a small role in it, and the guy was the lead, but I knew the director, so it wasn't completely out of line. But we were doing the scene where he had to get me to give him the phone number of a girl that worked with me, and he had to get me to give it to her. And I think he was used to working on soaps in Europe, he was a German soap actor, and he was doing this thing where he was just like, I don't know, not trying that hard.

Charlie Sandlan:

So you have no impulse to give him the number.

 Francis Benhamou:

So I wouldn't do it. Then at one point I said, "You got to try a little harder than that." I just said that. And I was like, oh God, I'm going to be in so much trouble.

Charlie Sandlan:

Did he take it? Did he try harder trouble? "What are you talking about? I am trying hard."

 Francis Benhamou:

He just kind of looked at me. I think he couldn't believe that I said that to him. And then the director, later on, we were joking. I knew that when they were editing that they were cracking up when they heard me say that. They were like, "Oh my God, Fran. That was crazy."

I'm like, "Come on. He wasn't giving me anything. I don't want to be a bad actor."

Charlie Sandlan:

I mean, listen, I could talk to you another hour, but I don't want to keep you on here.

 Francis Benhamou:

No, thank you. This was so nice.

Charlie Sandlan:

I really appreciate it.

 Francis Benhamou:

I really appreciate. This was really nice for me too. Thank you.

Charlie Sandlan:

So let's get out of here on this. I'll fade the music up. What advice would you like to offer to actors that are coming out of school or starting their career? And looking back now after the success you've had and not success, all of it, what would you say?

 Francis Benhamou:

You have to love it. You have to not be able to live without doing this because if not, it's really fucking hard. And you should quit if that's not the reason you're doing it. Because there's no easy road. Some people do have it, but it's luck and it's a miracle and it's random. And you know what? That won't even define whether they're actually happy doing it. I think it has to be something that you can't live without because you just have to breathe it and live it.

Charlie Sandlan:

Well, my fellow daydreamers, thank you for sticking around and keeping that phone in your pocket. Please subscribe and follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. If you got a few seconds and you can write a written review on iTunes that would help this show a lot. Please spread the word. Tell your friends about CBP. There's this incredible podcast for actors and artists. You can go to https://www.creatingbehaviorpodcast.com, go to the contact page, hit that red button. I use SpeakPipe. You can leave me a voice message. I will get back to you. I will answer you. You can also go to https://www.maggieflaniganstudio.com if you are interested in studying with me at my New York City Conservatory. And you can follow me on Instagram @creatingbehavior @maggieflaniganstudio

Lawrence Trailor, thank you for the song, my man. My friends, stay resilient, play full out with yourself, and don't ever settle for your second best. My name is Charlie Sandlan. Peace.