Who hasn’t seen the memes featuring Joanne the Scammer? Even if you don’t follow the character’s creator, Branden Miller, you’ve seen one of his snarky vids or well-captioned pics on the ‘Gram at some point or another.
And regardless of your feelings about a man in a wig, you’ve chuckled once or twice at the ridiculousness that is Joanne the Scammer. If Jhene Aiko and Solange Knowles have managed to catch a couple of clips and become fans, we can bet a few people in your circle are too.
The Fader traveled down to Daytona Beach, Florida to follow Miller for a couple of days. While there they got him to open up about the origins of the uber-popular web character and what he was doing before running around in a blonde wig and proclaiming that, as Joanne, he was a “messy b*tch.”
Miller shared the details of his childhood — from growing up in a religious household to how he found out that he was adopted. He also spoke candidly about earning money via porn before Joanne the Scammer took off and he was able to make a living from it.
From The Fader:
On Discovering His Adoption Status
“That was tragic, I’m not going to lie. I found out I was adopted, and then I found out I was black. I was like, Oh shit, none of these people are really related to me at all! That was a fucking…” He stops for a second. “I thought I was white. I had white friends. I was a white person! I still have my moments where I’m like, Oh my God. That’s really awkward.”
On Living Life As a Gay Man
Branden tells me he’s comfortable in his own skin, but online and in person he does things that suggest he still struggles. “When you ask me if I’m gay, I say yes,” he says. “Do I flaunt it? No.” He says the attitudes towards homosexuality that surrounded his Southern childhood are ingrained deep, and keep him from being open about his love life. “I was raised a certain way,” he says. “I never kiss my boyfriend in front of my mother. I never hold his hand. She knows we date, and she knows I love him, but I never do that in front of nobody, actually.”
On Joanna the Scammer
“It wasn’t my strategy, but it just so happens I play a character that allows me to do whatever I want,” he tells me. “It’s the one time I can kind of be free.”
The story reads like a movie script, honestly.
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Photo: screen cap
