Call Her Daddy host Alex Cooper transformed her podcast into a global sensation among women. However, in her Hulu documentary series Call Her Alex, she finally acknowledged the crucial role of her former co-host, Sofia Franklyn, in its success.
Franklyn left Call Her Daddy in 2020 after co-hosting with Cooper since the show started in 2018, a move that stunned fans. Cooper disclosed in the Hulu series that there were underlying issues behind the departure that were never publicly addressed.
“When I was informed, ‘Your show is the most listened to show in the world for podcasting by women,’ I thought, ‘That’s probably the coolest thing ever,’” Cooper remarked in the documentary, as reported by People and US Weekly. “Yet, it became challenging to enjoy the journey.”
Cooper then revealed that she and Franklyn had a complicated friendship.
“It was the classic, ‘You think you see something online and people genuinely believe you’re like sisters,’ but our relationship was so awful,” she said.
As Cooper described it, she and Franklyn ran into trouble after they renegotiated their contract with Barstool Sports, which she claimed made “millions of dollars” off the show.
“We absolutely deserved more money but unfortunately, we had signed a three-year contract with Barstool Sports, and they owned our IP,” Cooper said. “So Sofia and I went in together and we renegotiated our contract.”
Barstool Sports founder and CEO Dave Portnoy then came to them with “a deal of a lifetime.”
“He said, ‘If you stay at Barstool for one more year, you can own Call Her Daddy.’ Sofia didn’t want to take the deal, but I did, so I stayed,” Cooper claimed, later adding, “I realized the ‘Daddy Gang’ was bigger than both of us.”
Franklyn did not respond to Decider’s request for comment. But she previously revealed in an interview with Rolling Stone that she had multiple issues with how the negotiations occurred.
“I thought [Cooper was my] best friend, sister, and we are not hiding anything,” she said. “There’s no way in hell I would speak to our boss without you, that would be fucking crazy, and I don’t think that went both ways.”
She added, “Getting the IP back would’ve been great, but I’m not going to throw everything else out the fucking window.”
Franklyn has since struck out on her own and launched her own podcast, Sofia with an F.
Call Her Alex premieres on Hulu Tuesday, June 10.
