Meet Pedro Franco

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Pedro Franco. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Pedro below.

Pedro, so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?

I think a lot of people have a desire to find out what their “purpose” is, what they are “meant to do”. I can say that at this point in my life and my career I believe purpose to be about what is the activity that is most fulfilling to you, and usually it is what you do well; that other people find hard or scary; with the least amount of effort, and that I call talent. I played basketball for 7 years, and for those 7 years I worked as hard as a possibly could to become a professional basketball player at any level. With less then two years playing the sport I was able to get a scholarship to play at a small college in Florida. I went from being 6’7 154lbs to 6″7 230lbs over the course of five years, just by pushing myself to the limit. I LOVED basketball, but I was never talented I just worked really hard. My junior year I had an ankle injury that ended that dream and my body hasn’t been the same since. It was hard to let go of something that I loved so much, but I just couldn’t do it anymore physically. After coming to terms with that, one day, I decided to try stand up comedy. It was something I always admired and it fascinated me, and for as long as I can remember I have been able to make people laugh. Every team I played at all my teammates and coaches would tell me “You should be a comedian” and I never paid mind to that. When I did my first stand up set I immediately realized something very important. I wasn’t nervous on stage. I was very nervous before they called my name and heading to the bar where the open mic was happening, but as soon as I started talking I relaxed and focused. In 7 years of working as hard as a possibly could with countless hours of preparation I can’t remember a single game or practice where I wasn’t nervous about how well I would perform. That showed me that you can love something but not have a talent for it, but you can fall in love with something you actually are talented at once you find out what it is that you do well. I think that is the difference between passion and vocation. I believe you can do both in life. But I believe vocation will bring you far more success. So I found my purpose by trying out different things that I was passionate about and seeing which one was more suited for my set of skills. I believe the best way to find purpose is by trying different things when they speak to you. And by that I mean when something sparks your interest, dig. Find out more about that thing that caught your eye. Learn about it and do it, see how it makes you feel. You do that enough times you may find something really special.

Thanks, so before we move on maybe you can share a bit more about yourself?

I am a stand up comedian born in Brazil and based at Austin Texas. I perform stand up every night, and you can catch my sets at Black Rabbit Comedy Club, Vulcan Gas Company, East Austin Comedy Club, Velveeta Room amongst other venues. I found out I liked performing stand up comedy after I tried out twice when I was in college. I had a lot of fun doing it, but didn’t actively pursue it. Right after college I had a relationship fall apart in a very intense way and I ended up in North Dakota because of the relationship (that is where she was from). I didn’t know anybody up there other then her. And one of my good friends had just a month prior taken his own life, it was the worst depression I had ever felt in my life. But by a miracle they had a small stand up scene in Bismarck, ND and I started doing stand up again. Very quickly I shot up to the top of that scene and decided to move to a major one like New York or Los Angeles. But when I found out that Texas was now a hot spot for comedy and being a lot more affordable I decided to go there and my career took off.

Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?

I believe for me three skills that really helped were public speaking, writing and stage presence. Best advice I can give is what people told me, try to find out what things you do well with the least amount of practice and then develop those. Growing up I was very shy, in middle school and for the first two years of high school, I couldn’t even dream of asking a girl out on a date. But whenever I had to give a presentation in front of everyone I always spoke really well and I could tell I held people’s attention. Also whenever we were assigned essays I was always vey good writer. So once I started pursuing a craft where these three things were very helpful I did really well.

Who has been most helpful in helping you overcome challenges or build and develop the essential skills, qualities or knowledge you needed to be successful?

Knowing that the only way is trough. Life can get very dark sometimes. But we can choose to become very negative and bitter or we can strive to be cheerful. Keep in mind that you are responsible for how you carry yourself and we have a tendency that making things seem a lot harder in our minds. So try things out, sometimes they won’t work out but then you can say that you at least saw it trough.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: pedrofrancocomedy
• Other: I only use Instagram