Fran Drescher talks to Richelle Carey

Richelle Carey: You survived what had to have been one of the worst experiences that any woman could go through. You have told the story about you and your best friend being in your apartment, two brothers breaking into your apartment. They rape both of you as your husband at the time, Peter, witnessed this. Those two men are in prison now. What you said in an interview with Larry King was "With the rape, I mean, I became a deeper, more compassionate person. I became a better actor." How so?

Fran Drescher: I'm fortunate that I'm a creative person. I can take my pain and funnel those feelings into my work. I was able to use it in my acting and also to turn my pain into purpose and become someone that uses my life experience as well as my celebrity for the greater good.

You probably already know this number, but out of every 100 rapes, only about 40 are reported. And only about three rapists ever serve a day in jail. But you did get justice. Can you talk about what the process was like for you to actually get justice, whatever that may mean, for you?

I happened to be watching a morning talk show the week before. And one of the guests was a detective that was talking about how witnesses or victims make the worst witnesses. Because they're usually so frightened that they don't pick up on the details that would help the police apprehend the assailant. I remembered that interview that very night when we were held hostage at gunpoint. So I managed to really memorize the features of the man that was actually the rapist and in the room with us.

And so afterwards when it was time to speak to the police artist, I was the one that did it because I happen to have a photographic memory. When it was done, it looked like he had posed for it. And there had been so many things going on in my area that the police department for that community got funding to have a three-night stakeout. And if he hadn't re-entered the neighborhood in those three nights, they might not have ever caught him. But he actually took my car. The car was found in a neighborhood in Los Angeles.

On the last night of the stakeout they had these unmarked cars on different corners with plainclothesmen. They saw a car sitting in front with the motor running with plates from where they found my car. One detective called another and said, "I'm looking at a suspicious car." There was a woman sitting behind the steering wheel. Then the man, the rapist, got into the car. They started following him, and just before he got onto the freeway, which is only a few blocks away from where I was living at the time, they pulled the car over. He said, "I didn't do anything," but his fly was still unzipped and there was some poor woman's jewels hanging out of his pocket. And they had the picture. They looked at him and they looked at the picture and they said, "This is you. You're under arrest."

We got the call that they had apprehended someone. And we were to go down to the police station. They had, like, three school buses filled with witnesses and victims. He was on parole at the time. He said that he was on a rampage, and he was. And so he got like 150 years. He'll never be out of prison, and he'll never be up for parole. 

Think about how many people you saved.

Bad things happen to good people. You know, I speak openly about it because I think that it's important for victims to know that you can move on with your life. I mean, it may take you a little while. It took me like a good year before I stopped feeling like a shattered-mirror reflection of myself. But eventually you pull yourself up and you start all over again. And it becomes like a new normal.  Never what it was before. It is what it is. You have to play the hand that is dealt you. No one leaves this planet unscathed. So, you know, you just deal.

Do you deal with pain by using humor?

I guess so. Because, you know, I'm a cancer survivor, also. When I wrote my book “Cancer Schmancer,” it took me four drafts to find my comedy voice that at that point, I was already famous and people knew who I was. But it was a very cathartic experience, because I had to keep reflecting back and expel my bitterness and anguish and start remembering everything else that was happening, and reflect on the life lessons that were gained by it and the ways that my life actually improved as a result of my survival. And that side-by-side with pain lies joy, always.

When you're grief-stricken, you have to trust that there's something right there next to you that's joyful. It takes a little bit of effort. But it's there. And it behooves you to find it, to seek it out and look for it. Because when something bad happens, it is a slice of the pie. And you can easily make it consume you, eat you up alive. It's very hard to climb outta that pit. But if you really understand that it's not only just a slice of the whole pie of your life, but it's an opportunity for you to become a more refined version of yourself.

So, you know, that's what I set forth to do once I was diagnosed with cancer, because I had already been in extensive therapy as a result of the rape. And the series “The Nanny,” I wasn't totally — I wasn't totally happy at with myself and my marriage.

Even with all that success?

Right. So I knew something was wrong. Because I had reached my stride. I had a beautiful home. I had a husband that loved me. But something was wrong. When you scratch just beneath the surface, I hadn't fully dealt with the pain that I felt from the rape. I was already experiencing symptoms of gynecologic cancer, but was going undiagnosed. I was misdiagnosed.

Took two years ...

... for two years and eight doctors. When the series ended — which was fortuitous because the next year I was diagnosed, so this was like the last season of “The Nanny” — I wasn't feeling well. The marriage was busted apart. I was just very unhappy. It was like a perfect storm. From the gynecologic cancer, and the treatment of hormones to treat a benign condition that I never had — that was making me kinda wacky. The pressure of the show and the marriage and confronting — I wasn't really in touch with myself and my need to always be perfect, the perfect daughter, the perfect wife, the perfect star, the perfect human being — everybody's caregiver, never a taker, only a giver.

Which so many women feel.

I think I hit a brick wall and had, like, a classic garden-variety midlife crisis. Which over the course of the years that followed, my cancer was diagnosed.  Peter and I divorced, but then he came out, which was such a relief to me because I felt guilty that I left him because I'd never really done anything like that for myself at the expense of someone else. I totally lived for everyone else's happiness. Even to this day, I have to really, you know, like, pat myself on the back. "That was good, Fran, you know. It's good that you put yourself into the equation. It's OK that you said, you know, that's not going to work for you."

But it has been a journey. Peter and I are the dearest of friends. We've come out the other side, and that was one of the silver linings of being diagnosed with cancer.

You are a health advocate, particularly for women. Can you talk a little bit more about the really difficult process you went through of finally being properly diagnosed? What can women learn from what you went through?

You have to be able to transform from being a patient into a medical consumer. The very word "patient" implies passivity. You cannot let yourself be intimidated by the doctor. If they don't give you the time that you need, if they're not respectful that you want a second opinion, you're not with the right doctor. Always, when you suspect there's something seriously wrong, always go with somebody that's not going to fall apart or you have to worry about how they're handling this news. But they're actually going to be the strong one. You put one foot in front of the other and you forge ahead. On our website, CancerSchmancer.org, I give at least 18 tips on what to do when you think there's something seriously wrong with you. 

Let's talk about “The Nanny.” So 20 years ago, The New York Times had this headline that says, "Mary Poppins She's Not," as if they were surprised that your show was a hit.  In that same article, it talks about this encounter that you had on a plane, remember this, with the president of CBS. He says you said this to him. "You know, people don't understand. Because of the voice, they think I'm the seasoning in the show. That's wrong. I'm a main course. One day somebody is going to see that. One network is going to get lucky." So you saw him on a plane. You ran to the bathroom. You put on makeup and you sat down and you sold yourself to him.

Yes.

Is that how this went?

Well, he was a fan of mine. I had already done a short-lived series. And then I did another pilot. I had worked for the network, CBS, several times but nothing really flew. And he said to me, you know, the "We have a lot of pilot scripts that we've green-lighted. I'm sure there's gonna to be something for you." I said, "You know, nothing's gonna fit me hand in glove because I'm too offbeat. You have to listen to the ideas that me and Peter have." He was a captive audience. Where was he gonna go — coach? So nine and a half hours later as we pulled into Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, he said, "OK, when we get back to LA, call me up and I'll set you up a meeting with our development person." I didn't really have the “Nanny” idea in my head at the time. But I ended up going to my girlfriend's house in the South of France, which was where I was connecting to, and she forgot to mention that she was gonna be there with her two screaming toddlers. I thought I would I would lose my mind. And Peter said Twiggy, the one and only, had called and invited me to visit her and her family in London. So I said to my girlfriend in France, "I have to get outta here. I love you, but this is no vacation."

I went to visit Twiggy and her family in London. Well, she and her husband were busy working. I started taking their little 12-year-old schoolgirl all over London with me. And she was just a proper little British schoolgirl. She's walking around and she said, "Oh, Fran, my new shoes are hurting me." I'm thinking, "What is this, she wants me to take her home?" I said, "Honey, step on the backs of 'em." And she said, "Won't that break them?" And I said, "Break them in." And I thought to myself, oh, this is such a funny relationship because I'm not telling her what's good for her. I'm telling her what's good for me. 

When I went to bed, 5:00 in the morning, it was still early in L.A. because it was eight hours earlier. I called Peter. I said, you know, "I think I have the idea that we should pitch to Jeff." I said, "What do you think about a spin on 'The Sound of Music,' only instead of Julie Andrews, I come to the door?" He thought for just a moment. And he has an excellent sense of these things. He said, "That's it. That's the show we're gonna develop and pitch." That was the beginning of “The Nanny.”

Your career is more than one role. You're on Broadway right now playing the wicked stepmother in “Cinderella.” Why that role?

You know, this is the first character that I've ever played that really is kind of a mean character. I'm usually like the hooker with the heart of gold. I was really worried at first. Even during rehearsal, I was thinking, I can't say these things. It's so awful. And everybody's gonna hate me. But slowly but surely, through the rehearsal process, I reinvented the character.

I made her very glamorous and self-absorbed and very fun to watch, and really someone that you love to hate. And then, you know, she kind of comes around in the end and softens a bit. She's not the same through the whole show. She grows. I was just so thrilled to be offered, you know, a role in a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, because I'm not really a singer. And this role happens to be the biggest speaking part and the smallest singing part. And to be on Broadway in such a classic tale in a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, it's just phenomenal. I'm having such a large experience. It's one of the great highlights in my career.

This interview has been edited and condensed.