Fran is a US actress and producer who is known primarily for comedic roles, especially so because of her distinctive voice and laugh, but she is also a survivor, an advocate, and an activist.
From Wikipedia: Drescher was a first runner-up for "Miss New York Teenager" in 1973, as revealed in her first autobiography "Enter Whining" released December 29, 1995, and on her interview on William Shatner's Raw Nerve, which first aired on January 27, 2009. She attended Hillcrest High School in Jamaica, Queens, where she met her future husband, Peter Marc Jacobson, whom she married in 1978, at age 21. They divorced in 1999.[3] Jacobson was Drescher's constant supporter in her show-business career, and he wrote, directed and produced her signature television series, The Nanny. Drescher graduated from Hillcrest High School in 1975, the same year comedian Ray Romano graduated from [the same] high school. Drescher's character Fran Fine on The Nanny and Romano's character Ray Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond met at a 20th high school reunion. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran_Drescher
Her early film appearances were as memorable as they were brief: she's the young woman who asks John Travolta if he's as good in bed as he is on the dance floor in Saturday Night Fever. She played Sally in Hollywood Nights (the young woman who takes Turk to task for premature ejaculation). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hollywood_Knights
And this (start at about 1:12) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4Pm4CQ1NjY
She's worked steadily and successfully for over 30 years, see, e.g., http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000376/ , but she's done so much more than act and produce.
She works to support LGBT issues (her ex-husband, with whom she still shares a close personal and working relationship, came out after they divorced). Although she is a democrat, G.W. Bush appointed her as the Public Diplomacy Envoy for Women's Health Issues. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran_Drescher
And (the reason I am profiling her today), after surviving uterine cancer (for which she had been misdiagnosed for 2 years), she founded Cancer Schmancer. http://www.cancerschmancer.org/frans-story
Fran says: We need to take control of our bodies, become greater partners with our physicians and galvanize as one to let our legislators know that the collective female vote is louder and more powerful than that of the richest corporate lobbyists. As Frederick Douglass said, "Power concedes nothing without demand. It never has and it never will."I got famous, then I got cancer, and now I live to talk about it. Sometimes the best gifts come in the ugliest packages. Please lock elbows with me and join the Cancer Schmancer Movement so together we can do what needs to be done, so less of us will die prematurely. Id.
Fran has received the John Wayne Institute’s Woman of Achievement Award, the Gilda Award, the City of Hope Woman of the Year Award, the Hebrew University Humanitarian Award, the Albert Einstein College of Medicine’s Spirit of Achievement Award. the City of Hope Spirit of Life Award,and the first "My Aid Award" for her achievements in support of cancer prevention and rehabilitation. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran_Drescher
For more information:
http://www.cancerschmancer.org/
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000376/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fran_Drescher
http://www.frandrescher.com/
