Will Franken

Will Franken’s strange life story is the kind that standup comedians dream of having and independent filmmakers dream of concocting. A brilliant and hilarious youngster with a penchant for psychedelic drugs, Franken came head to head with a tyrannical father and a stiff Midwestern hometown before fleeing both to seek fame and fortune in New York City — earning an Associate’s degree in Acting and a Master’s degree in English en route. Franken’s Big Apple existence was also marked by highs and lows, from nailing a lucrative gig as the mascot of online library Questia, to teaching social studies and English at a middle school in Harlem. He was a fixture in New York’s Greenwich Village’s alternative theatre scene.
The bumpy life continued as Franken, broke but determined to make a name for himself in comedy, came to San Francisco from New York by way of North Carolina — with $300 to his name and no housing or employment prospects. Between spending nights in his car at the Berkeley Marina and days looking for typist work, Franken hit every open mic show and poetry slam he could find. In less than three years, his determination paid off as he quickly built a solid reputation as one of San Francisco’s most original comedic acts.
Franken established himself as a San Francisco cult figure and was selected “Best Comedian” by SF Weekly and “Best Alternative to Psychedelic Drugs” by the San Francisco Bay Guardian. Tribe.net named him one of the Top 25 People to Watch Nationwide. His solo show Good Luck With It debuted at the New York International Fringe Festival to rave reviews by the New York Times, and ran at San Francisco’s Marsh Theater. “Madonna reinvents herself every year. I reinvent myself every two minutes,” Franken says. You can see that principle at work in both his comedy and his life: Always keep moving because things are bound to get — in the words of a San Francisco Bay Guardian article about Franken — more “bizarre and fabulous.”
In late 2007, Franken’s east coast fan base was thrilled to learn that he had re-relocated to New York City. After consecutive sold-out one-man shows at the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre and appearances at numerous other performance spaces large and small, Franken continues to wow audiences and increase his legion of fans.