Garcelle Beauvais has made a habit of keeping it real.
On Bravo’s Real Housewives of Beverly Hills, where she’s been a cast member since 2020, Beauvais adds a much-needed dose of candor to a group that’s often criticized for their phoniness. The actress is also a co-host on Fox’s Emmy-winning daytime talk show The Real, dishing out sharp takes on everything from pop culture to politics. Then there’s Going To Bed with Garcelle, her weekly podcast that explores sex and relationships from a humorous, unfiltered perspective. So it should come as no surprise that Beauvais has an endless supply of opinions and life advice—or “Garcelle Gems,” as she refers to them—in her upcoming book Love Me As I Am.
There’s hardly been a better time for the 55-year-old Hollywood veteran to pen a memoir (with the help of her longtime friend Nicole E. Smith). She’s been contemplating the project for years, but as she tells The Daily Beast, it didn’t feel right until just recently.
“I feel like I’m in a good place personally and professionally,” Beauvais says. “And it felt like I had made some peace with some things in my past. I thought maybe my story can inspire someone, whether it’s a woman who, at a later age in life, gets a divorce and doesn’t know how to pick up the pieces, or just someone who can relate to my relationship with my dad or my mom.”
Love Me As I Am, out on April 12, is a compelling, amusing portrait of Beavais’ storied life and emotional journey toward happiness, or “finding [her] G-spot,” as she puts it. Aside from her glitzy professional life, she details her childhood in Haiti, her fractured relationship with her father, her approach to raising two Black sons, and her struggles with infertility. The personal anecdotes and life lessons she shares have the potential to resonate with any reader, despite the aspects of Beavuais’ life that are so uniquely Hollywood.
For instance, she writes about her two failed marriages, one of which was to Mike Nilon, a talent agent at Creative Arts Agency. After being married for nine years and giving birth to twin boys, Beauvais discovered that Nilon had been having a years-long affair with another woman. In maybe the most stereotypical (and iconic) actress behavior, she sent out an explosive mass email to her husband’s co-workers exposing his affair, which, naturally, was picked up by several tabloids.
Despite the emotional bruises left from the divorce, Beauvais walked away with a new set of priorities, her hard-won independence, and a laundry list of behaviors she would no longer tolerate in her romantic life.
“Even in the worst moments where I’m deeply hurt or betrayed or troubled, I tried to find a good in that,” Beauvais says. “Even when I was going through my divorce and I was in the most pain I had ever felt, I remember hearing—and I don’t know where this voice came from—but I remember hearing, ‘This is exactly where you need to be.’”
She writes about her current love life with some uncertainty, but accepts that she’ll be just fine whether or not she ever finds “the one.”
“My life will go on,” she asserts. “We put so much pressure on women—society, that is—about having a man, having a child. Like, can we just be? I’m ‘being’ right now.”
Of course, the most fascinating and page-turning sections of the book are about Beauvais’ experiences in Hollywood in the ’90s and early aughts—including a flirtation with her former co-star Jamie Foxx, a negative experience at The View, and what she describes as a close call with Bill Cosby after she met with him at his home (and left early). She isn’t afraid to reveal the good, the bad, and the ugly of working with some big industry names, though she maintains that her book is far from a tacky tell-all.
“That’s not my mission in life,” she says. “That’s not my thing. I just wanted to share my stories and really not take anyone down.”
In one memorable chapter, she writes about her disappointing tenure as a guest panelist on The View in 2015 and the disconnect she felt with some of the other women on and off-camera, including a kick under the table. Given the space she would occupy on television several years later as a host of The Real, it makes sense to include such a juicy anecdote.
“Because this is my journey, it’s my point of view,” she continues. “It’s like, if you’re in my path and I’m telling a story, I have to include you.”
Since getting her start as a model at age 16, Beauvais has experienced the sort of busy, well-rounded career that anyone with a wide range of talents could only dream of. In the mid-’90s and early aughts, she was best known for her television work playing Francesca “Fancy” Monroe on The WB’s The Jamie Foxx Show and Valerie Heywood on NYPD Blue, in addition to several guest appearances on popular ’90s sitcoms. She’s also acted in Coming to America (and its sequel), Wild Wild West, Barbershop 2, and Spider-Man: Homecoming, among other films.
In her book, she writes about the “urban” and “stereotypically hood” roles that were largely available to her at the time and the meager pay she received as a Black actress. Fortunately, she’s stuck it out long enough to see Hollywood embrace Black stories that are more complex and human. She’s even taken things into her own hands by making decisions behind the camera with her production company, Garcelle Beauvais Productions, which recently signed a first-look deal with NBCUniversal Streaming and Television. While she can’t disclose any details yet, she wants to produce both scripted and unscripted content.
“I feel like I’ve rejuvenated my love for Hollywood because I see that we’re being seen now and being valued and being given opportunities,” she says. “And now I feel braver asking for what I think I’m worth, as opposed to before. I would take it knowing my counterparts are making triple what I’m earning.”
The multi-hyphenate has long been a recognizable face to Black audiences. But the recent cultural cachet she’s gained among Real Housewives of Beverly Hills viewers has granted her a bigger spotlight and newfound appreciation of her work. Frustratingly, Beauvais’ presence on the series as the first Black Housewife has been a controversial one so far, as she’s dealt with a number of microaggressions from her white castmates and an overall feeling of exclusion.
Going into her third year on the Bravo show, Beauvais says she felt more at ease. Particularly, she said it made a difference “not being the only Black girl in the room,” as she’s joined by her friend (and Will Smith’s ex-wife) Sheree Zampino later on in the season.
“I definitely felt more comfortable with the group and felt lighter,” she admits. “And what I was hoping we would do this coming season—and I think we did—is inject a lot more fun. I mean, yes, of course, the drama will always happen. But I think we were able to have fun because I think the audience wants to go on that ride, too.”
Much of the drama last season revolved around cast member Erika Jayne, whose ex-husband and former attorney Tom Girardi is facing federal charges for misappropriating funds meant for the families of plane crash victims. Beauvais was vocal in denouncing how Jayne handled the lawsuit publicly, specifically the lack of empathy the “XXPEN$IVE” singer showed for her husband’s victims. Recently, she unfollowed Jayne on Instagram, revealing that she “called [her] something that [she] didn’t like.” But now, Beauvais thinks they’re back on good terms.
“I mean, I haven’t seen her since we wrapped, but I think we’re in a better place,” she says. “And what I have to say is, you know, we did hit a bump. But we got to a place where we could disagree respectfully, and I appreciated that. And I think she did, too.”
While Bravo fans wait with bated breath for the Season 12 trailer to arrive, the ever-industrious Beauvais is hard at work promoting her new book and filming daily episodes of The Real, which, according to several blogs last week, is headed for cancellation. Beauvais says she knows nothing about the future of the show and hopes the rumors aren’t true. But whether or not the talk show survives, she has more than enough projects to keep her busy. If the stories in Love Me As I Am are any indication, it’s impossible for her not to land on her feet.
