François Arnaud isn’t entirely sure where he lives nowadays—or more precisely, where he belongs. The Montreal-born actor is holed up in the Laurentians, in a house he built with a friend during the pandemic, surrounded by whispering pines and the occasional deer wandering by his window. It’s where he often retreats to recharge after performing emotionally demanding roles—most recently, in German Canadian filmmaker Wiebke von Carolsfeld’s upcoming drama Someone’s Daughter, where he plays a man kidnapped along with the criminal lawyer who once defended him against a rape charge. “You feel depleted after a role like that, and you have to find ways to replenish,” he says, the autumn sun streaking the room with molten orange. “I’m glad I have my place in the woods here, but I also don’t want to live in the middle of nowhere by myself. Maybe one day, but the quiet is loud.”

Arnaud has spent recent years in Los Angeles, yet with his sights now set on New York and a heart that still tugs him toward Quebec, “home” is a slippery notion. “It’s a weird time in my life, because I feel like I’ve gotten to know myself more, and I know who I am. And that’s great. But I kind of don’t know where I want to be,” the 40-year-old actor says. “I’ve always enjoyed being everything, everywhere, all at once. But I’m looking for things that make me feel more grounded and to live in a place that mirrors how I feel about the world. And that’s become increasingly difficult.”

Loro Piana look.

That tension between motion and stillness mirrors his career. Since breaking out in Quebec filmmaker Xavier Dolan’s 2009 debut J’ai tué ma mère (I Killed My Mother), Arnaud has leapt across genres, languages, and worlds—from the scheming Renaissance courts of the Showtime drama The Borgias to the eerie streets of the NBC supernatural thriller Midnight, Texas, and now, the steamy locker rooms of Crave’s gay hockey romance Heated Rivalry. Given that range, he’s never comfortably settled into one corner of the industry, a restlessness that echoes his nomadic streak.

As a young actor, Arnaud felt the pull from south of the border, drawn to something bigger, louder, messier than the polite restraint of Canadian life. “In the U.S., especially the big cities, there’s something about the extremes that’s appealing and can fuel creativity. It’s a lot of things, but it’s not boring. It’s grittier. It’s edgier. It’s more punk.” But having just turned 40, he admits the thrill has dulled.

Prada look.

 

Increasingly uncomfortable with the political violence in the United States, Arnaud has a newfound appreciation for Canadian culture.

___

“As I get older, the things that I found a bit beige about Canada, I’m like, you know what? Maybe kindness and niceness are underrated.” —François Arnaud

 

He now inhabits a liminal space, geographically and professionally, where uncertainty feels less like a threat and more like an invitation. With a slate of daring indies and subversive dramas ahead, and the sort of wandering soul magazine profiles are made of, he’s letting instinct, not expectation, chart his next chapter. “I don’t have a straight answer for where I’m headed, but those are all the questions populating my brain. I’m trying to embrace this momentary unknown.”

For now, that open-endedness is drawing him back to Canada for work. This past spring, Arnaud was in Toronto filming Heated Rivalry, Jacob Tierney’s series about a secret same-sex romance. Based on Canadian author Rachel Reid’s Game Changers book series, the drama casts Arnaud as Scott Hunter, a hockey star who falls for a male barista. Though a supporting role, the third episode belongs solely to him. “I was reading the script, and I called my agent. I’m like, ‘Are you reading this? I don’t know that I can do this. This feels like porn,’” Arnaud says, laughing.

Hermès coat, trousers, and boots; tank top stylist’s own.

“And then Jacob turns it on its head and it becomes super heartfelt without being cheesy. And it’s just joyous.” That joy is rare and refreshing in queer storytelling, and part of what drew him to the project. Arnaud, who came out publicly as bisexual a few years ago, liked the script’s optimism. “I think gay stories very often come with so much trauma. There’s always AIDS lurking, or the main character has to die, or whatever. There’s like a penance and a heaviness to it,” he says. “Heated Rivalry is charged, but it’s not shallow. It’s escapism in the best possible way. I dabble in a lot of darker shit, so it’s nice to do something hopeful.”

Off-screen, Arnaud’s learned to live with that same unapologetic freedom. When he announced he was bisexual in an Instagram story during the pandemic, it made headlines—but for him, it was simply about being honest. “I’d already moved past it in my private life, and I wanted my public life to reflect that.” While he wasn’t looking to invite conversation about his private life, he wanted to feel aligned with who he really was. “I didn’t feel ashamed about it, but for me, lying about it felt like a shameful act. I wanted to be in line with my values. This is what I believe in, and it’s more important than whatever effect it has on my career.

That same refusal to live out of sync with himself guides his professional choices too. He opts for roles that challenge or fulfil him rather than ones that just look shiny on his IMDB page. “I had a moment recently where people were telling me to just wait around for the next big thing. I’m always up for bigger things, but the industry has shrunk,” he says.

Louis Vuitton look; Longines Ultra-Chron Carbon watch.

“If someone sends me a script for a cool indie that I love, and there’s a great role in it, I can’t say, ‘Oh no, I’m going to wait at home because this or that might happen.’” And so, Fucktoys, the absurdist debut feature from Billions actress Annapurna Sriram, where she portrays a young sex worker seeking to break a curse by raising $1,000 for psychics. Arnaud plays one of her clients: a problematic, possibly sociopathic DJ. “I like complicated parts,” Arnaud says. “They force me to have empathy for people for whom I wouldn’t have in real life.”

That appetite for complexity goes way back. Arnaud accompanied his mother to plays as heady as Cyrano de Bergerac when he was as young as eight. “I wanted to do grown-up stuff—even if I didn’t understand it.” He honed that curiosity in amateur theatre and eventually the Conservatoire d’art dramatique de Montréal, where he first crossed paths with Dolan. The young director, then just 17, approached Arnaud after one of his plays. According to Arnaud, Dolan handed him a script and said, “Read this. We’re going to go to Cannes with this.”

Dior look.

Turns out Dolan was right. J’ai tué ma mère, the Oedipal coming-of-age drama he directed and stars in, marked him as a major new voice in cinema. Meanwhile, Arnaud’s charming, magnetic performance as Antonin—the emotionally grounded boyfriend to Dolan’s tempestuous teen protagonist—immediately drew attention. Major auditions started falling into his lap. He recalls doing screen tests for a role in the Pirates of the Caribbean series with Johnny Depp, sitting in waiting rooms with Jake Gyllenhaal and Ryan Reynolds for a Bourne film, and multiple callbacks for a role in a galaxy far, far away. “I auditioned like eight times for Star Wars,” Arnaud says, adding he was vying for Oscar Isaac’s role in the sequel trilogy. “They kept bringing me back, and they never gave me a part.”

___

François Arnaud inhabits a liminal space, geographically and professionally, where uncertainty feels less like a threat and more like an invitation. With a slate of daring indies and subversive dramas ahead, he’s letting instinct, not expectation, chart his next chapter.

He now plays the Hollywood game with clearer eyes. He still shows up for the big auditions—“I’m certainly throwing my hat in the ring,” he says—but his heart lies elsewhere. His career feels less like a rising star and more like a constellation: bright, scattered, and impossible to predict. He’ll appear in Guillaume Lonergan’s upcoming HBO Max miniseries Alice about France’s Alice Guy Blaché, the world’s first female filmmaker. He also stars in In Transit, Jaclyn Bethany’s slow-burning indie about a barmaid who forms an unexpected connection with a painter in the midst of an existential crisis. And he’s just booked another hockey project: “It’s a very straight bro hockey film,” he says, laughing, “where I play a cutthroat character.”

Boss x Steiff coat.

He admits he’d love to land a role in a series that lasts several years—a home base, for once—but he’s not rushing it. In an era of AI disruption, studio reshuffling, and looming film tariffs, uncertainty is the only constant. Fortunately, he’s built for it. With his range and quiet adaptability, he can weather the storm. The industry—hell, the world—may keep shifting underfoot, but he’s the kind of actor who never loses balance.

Arnaud may not know where he’s going, but right now, he’s exactly where he needs to be: in the present, doing the work, and enjoying the ride. “I just try to be humble and grateful for the work that I get, and I try to enjoy every moment, every minute of the process. And I think it’s made me a better actor.”

École de Pensée coat, tank, and trousers; Louis Vuitton shoes; Parts of Four earring; socks stylist’s own.

SHARE