“Mean Girls” alum Daniel Franzese is opening up about his coming-out story.
Franzese revealed to Page Six that he was “brainwashed” into cutting ties with his mother and undergoing conversion therapy to “convert” him to heterosexuality when he was 21 years old in 1999, five years before starring as out and proud Damian in “Mean Girls.”
The actor, who is currently working on the play “Italian Moms Love You!,” explained that he forced himself to undergo the pseudoscientific practice of conversion therapy because he “didn’t want to be gay” and “didn’t know what to do” as part of his Catholic and Pentecostal Christian faith. Franzese added that the “world around” him made him “feel like being gay was not Ok.”
Franzese worked with a conversion therapist who “used to be gay” himself for six months and was recommended by Franzese’s grandmother’s pastor.
“I went to one-on-one therapy sessions...
Franzese revealed to Page Six that he was “brainwashed” into cutting ties with his mother and undergoing conversion therapy to “convert” him to heterosexuality when he was 21 years old in 1999, five years before starring as out and proud Damian in “Mean Girls.”
The actor, who is currently working on the play “Italian Moms Love You!,” explained that he forced himself to undergo the pseudoscientific practice of conversion therapy because he “didn’t want to be gay” and “didn’t know what to do” as part of his Catholic and Pentecostal Christian faith. Franzese added that the “world around” him made him “feel like being gay was not Ok.”
Franzese worked with a conversion therapist who “used to be gay” himself for six months and was recommended by Franzese’s grandmother’s pastor.
“I went to one-on-one therapy sessions...
- 6/28/2022
- by Samantha Bergeson
- Indiewire
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