Frankie Grande Has a Blunt Message for Gay Men Right Now

“You need to support each other, you stupid faggots.” Frankie Grande did not hesitate when HomoCulture asked what gay men are getting wrong right now. Dating, body image, social media, and nightlife were all on the table. Grande went straight for something bigger. “We need to stand side by side with each other instead of ripping each other apart. That’s all I see. Instead of uplifting each other, we’re tearing each other down.”

The exchange happened during Northalsted Market Days in Chicago, where Grande had just done what he does so well: command attention. On stage, he brought the body, movement, confidence, humor, and theatrical energy that made him a natural fit for a massive LGBTQ street festival. Off stage, HomoCulture sat down with him for an exclusive interview that quickly moved beyond his performance and into a frank conversation about how gay men treat each other, why the community needs to stand with trans people, and where he still wants to see LGBTQ people break through.

Grande also talked about becoming Frankie Grande before his family became famous, the career goal he still wants badly enough to make a direct pitch to James Gunn, and why gatherings like Market Days remain important when being openly LGBTQ can still carry very different consequences depending on where someone lives. His answers were funny, profane, serious, and remarkably consistent. For Grande, visibility means very little if people are unwilling to stand beside one another when it counts.

Frankie Grande Was Finding Himself Long Before the Fame

Grande has spent years being discussed in relation to his famous family, but his own timeline starts before that became part of his public story.

“I think I was working before anyone knew who my family was,” Grande said. “I was on Broadway when I was 23 years old. I started to really step into my own truth right then, in the beginning.”

Those early Broadway years gave him his first real chance to figure out who Frankie Grande was going to be. He booked Mamma Mia! in 2006 and became Mr. Broadway in 2007, experiences he remembers as part of growing up on the Great White Way.

“In 2006, when I booked Mamma Mia!, and in 2007, when I was Mr. Broadway, those initial years of me growing up as a kid, basically on the Great White Way, really developed me into who I was,” Grande said. “That’s when I started to discover who Frankie Grande was, way before Ariana was on Nickelodeon and way before I was on Nickelodeon.”

The family comparison ends there because Grande’s point is more interesting than who became famous when. He was already working out his own identity on Broadway and continued doing it as his audience grew.

“Even my early days on YouTube were me trying to figure out who the fuck I am in this world,” he said. “I still think I am trying to figure out who I am in this world, but those early Broadway years were very formative for me. That was when I was starting to figure things out.”

There is an appealing lack of finality in that answer. Grande can walk onto a stage looking completely certain of himself while acknowledging that the person underneath all that confidence is still evolving.

HomoCulture has had the opportunity to photograph Grande in several LGBTQ settings over the years. He appeared at the Twilight T-Dance during Gay Wine Weekend in Sonoma Valley in 2023, and HomoCulture photographed him again during the NYC Pride March in 2024. Market Days offered something different: the chance to put down the camera for a few minutes and ask what is on his mind right now.

Want more Frankie? See the full 50-photo Frankie Grande gallery from Northalsted Market Days on HomoCulture’s Facebook page, with more moments from his high-energy Chicago performance.

His answer about gay men was impossible to miss.

Frankie Grande Wants Gay Men to Stop Tearing Each Other Down

“You need to support each other, you stupid faggots.”

Grande’s opening line was deliberately provocative, coming from one gay man speaking directly to another about their own community. He did not leave the point sitting behind the shock of the word.

“We need to stand side by side with each other instead of ripping each other apart. That’s all I see.”

Then he said it again in even simpler terms.

“Instead of uplifting each other, we’re tearing each other down.”

That observation cuts close to some uncomfortable parts of gay culture. Judgment can come quickly. Bodies get compared. Age becomes a dividing line. Dating profiles can read like exclusion lists. Social media gives snark, pile-ons, status, and criticism an instant audience. Nightlife and social circles can create their own pecking orders.

None of that means gay men need to agree with one another all the time. Grande is asking for something much more basic: stop treating another gay man’s success, body, age, popularity, relationships, or way of living as an invitation to tear him apart.

“We need to stand side by side with each other instead of ripping each other apart.”

The same argument becomes much more urgent when Grande talks about who needs that support most.

For more original celebrity interviews, gay culture, Pride, and LGBTQ stories, subscribe to HomoCulture.

His Message to Gay Men Includes Standing With Trans People

Grande sees the treatment of trans people as part of the same conversation about community responsibility.

“We desperately need to support our trans brothers and sisters and siblings because they really need us right now,” he said. “I think there are a lot of members of this community who think that their problem is not our problem, and that couldn’t be further from the truth.”

Then came the line that may say more about Grande’s view of LGBTQ solidarity than anything else in the interview.

“Their problems are our problems. If they’re coming for them, they’re coming for us. So step the fuck up.”

There is very little to add to that.

Grande rejects the idea that gay men can watch attacks on trans people from a safe distance and assume those fights belong to somebody else. HomoCulture has examined that same concern in its coverage of how attacks on LGBTQ advocacy can reach far beyond the group first being targeted.

“Their problems are our problems. If they’re coming for them, they’re coming for us.”

His message also puts a harder meaning behind the idea of community. Sharing an acronym is easy. Showing up for somebody when their rights, safety, or ability to live openly are being challenged asks more of people.

Grande’s instruction is considerably shorter.

“Step the fuck up.”

Frankie Grande Wants His Shot at Being a Gay Superhero

The conversation needed some air after that, and Grande supplied it.

Asked whether there was something audiences still had not seen from him, he did not pitch another reality show or stage project.

“I want to do a major movie. I really want to be in a movie. I want to be a gay superhero in a movie.”

Grande already has a preferred cinematic universe in mind.

“I think it’s time. We need to have more gay superheroes, period. I think I should be in a DC movie. James Gunn, call me.”

Consider the pitch officially made.

Of course, Grande being Grande, that was only the restrained version.

“Let’s put a fucking faggot superhero in a goddamn movie for the world to consume, because I feel like we’re still so far behind in representation, especially in mainstream nerd culture for gays.”

The humor makes the line memorable. The frustration underneath it gives the idea weight.

LGBTQ characters have become more visible across film and television, but Grande wants the gay character to get the powers, the action, the fantasy, and the scale that straight heroes have been handed for generations. HomoCulture has explored that territory from another angle with Maxxie LaWow: Drag Super-Shero, an animated adventure that puts LGBTQ characters directly inside superhero storytelling.

Grande wants a major live-action version of that opportunity.

He also appears to have decided who should play him.

James Gunn, your move.

Market Days Gave Frankie Grande the Right Place to Say It

Northalsted Market Days provided a fitting backdrop for a conversation centered on visibility.

The annual Chicago street festival fills a half-mile stretch of the Northalsted/Lakeview neighborhood with live music, drag, food, vendors, nightlife, and crowds of LGBTQ people. Grande arrived as one of the weekend’s performers, but when HomoCulture asked what gatherings like Market Days offer people at a time of uncertainty, he talked about something more basic than entertainment.

“I think they provide a safe space for the community to be ourselves, which is a really important thing right now.”

Grande is also well aware that the ability to live openly is far from equal across the United States.

“There are these horrible deep-red pockets of this country where it’s just not safe to be who we are, who we truly are.”

Then he gave Market Days a Frankie Grande rebrand.

“Events like Market Days, ‘Market Gays,’ I like to call it, are really important right now for us to remember that we are fabulous exactly the way we are.”

That line brings the interview back to where it started.

Grande spent his early career trying to work out who he was. He now wants gay men to give each other more support while they do the same. He wants the community beside trans people instead of watching from the sidelines. He wants gay characters occupying bigger spaces in mainstream entertainment. And he sees LGBTQ gatherings as places where people can practice being visible together rather than making themselves smaller.

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What Frankie Grande Wants Gay Men to Remember

Back on the Market Days stage, the photographs tell one part of the Frankie Grande story: skin, movement, expression, confidence, and a performer who has no interest in disappearing into the background. His interview made the argument behind that visibility much clearer.

What did you make of Grande’s call for gay men to support one another, stand with trans people, and demand more room in mainstream culture? Share your thoughts in the comments. Grande left HomoCulture with the line he wanted the community to remember: “We are unstoppable. If we do stand together, we can accomplish great things, and we need to.”

Disclosure: HomoCulture attended Northalsted Market Days as part of a hosted media visit organized by Choose Chicago. Northalsted Market Days coordinated HomoCulture’s interview with Frankie Grande. Editorial coverage remains independently produced by HomoCulture.