Psychic Medium Matt Fraser and his Girlfriend, pageant queen Alexa Papigiotis join us to talk about their new reality TV show ‘Meet The Frasers’ coming soon to E! Entertainment.
The 2020 reality sitcom follows their big families in the small town of Cranston, Rhode Island.
INSIDE LOOK: A Look At Love Inside ‘Meet The Frasers’
Matt Fraser and his girlfriend, Alexa Papigiotis join digital reporter, Emily Gibbs for this week’s Rhode Extra! Hear what they have to say about their relationship, even giving the details of their first date. We have the inside scoop!
In a deal for a book by a man the publisher calls “America’s top psychic medium,” Gallery Books bought Matt Fraser’s When Heaven Calls. Jeremie Ruby-Strauss tookworld rights to the book from Imal Wagner at Phoenix Rising PR.
Fraser, S&S said, regularly mounts sold-out shows across the country; he is also set to star in his own reality show, E!’s forthcoming Meet the Frasers. The memoir is set for March 2020 and will, S&S explained, detail how the author “discovered his spiritual gift, what it’s like to connect with souls on the other side, and what communicating with the dead has taught him about embracing life.”
GALLERY BOOKS is an imprint dedicated to publishing a variety of must-read books on a wide array of topics. Launched in February 2010, Gallery is designed to showcase established voices and to introduce emerging new ones—in both fiction and nonfiction genres. Some of Gallery Books’ bestselling titles include Unhinged by Omarosa Manigault Newman, The Death of Mrs. Westaway and The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware, The Last Black Unicorn by Tiffany Haddish, The Girl with the Lower Back Tattoo by Amy Schumer, Paradox by Catherine Coulter,Five Presidents by Clint Hill, The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen
Chbosky, and Love Anthony by Lisa Genova.
SIMON & SCHUSTER, a part of CBS Corporation, is a global leader in general interest publishing, dedicated to providing the best in fiction and nonfiction for readers of all ages, and in all printed, digital and audio formats. Its distinguished roster of authors includes many of the world’s most popular and widely recognized writers, and winners of the most prestigious literary honors and awards. It is home to numerous well-known imprints and divisions such as Simon & Schuster, Scribner, Atria Books, Gallery Books, Pocket Books, Adams Media, Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing and Simon & Schuster Audio and international companies in Australia,
Canada, India and the United Kingdom, and proudly brings the works of its authors to readers in more than 200 countries and territories. For more information visit our website at www.simonandschuster.com.
As a child, Matt Fraser was scared of his abilities. After learning they are gifts and not a curse, he uses those abilities to help others connect with their loved ones, get answers and find closure.
Fraser will host a live group reading Tuesday, Aug. 27, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., in an audience setting at Brattleboro’s Latchis Theatre. An internationally-recognized psychic medium and author, Fraser has performed hundreds of thousands of readings around the world and makes regular appearances on television and radio.
He inherited the family gift — both his grandmother and mother were also psychic. However, he didn’t understand it early on. Every night when he’d go to bed, he’d hear whispers and voices in his empty room trying to get his attention.
“I’d be in my bedroom yelling, screaming and crying,” said Fraser in a recent interview with ELF. “The more I tried to make it stop, the louder and stronger (the voices) became.”
By the time he reached middle-school age, he had shut the voices off and buried them completely — something his grandmother had also done. She grew up in a strict Catholic household where she wasn’t allowed to acknowledge her psychic experiences as a child.
Later in life, she would give private readings for close friends and family because her own husband didn’t know about her abilities. Fraser’s mother also kept her gifts hidden.
He later had a psychic reading of his own, during which he was connected to the spirit of his grandmother. She told him to embrace his gifts and use them to deliver messages from those who had passed into the spirit world to bring healing and comfort to those left behind. It gave him clarity moving forward.
At that point, he was 19 years old, working as an EMT in Boston. “I wanted to realize what it was that I had,” he said. He instantly reconnected with his abilities and it all came back to him. He started reading for friends and family.
Word traveled and he was invited to appear on major television networks talking about his abilities and do on-air readings. Aside from his live events, Fraser has been active in aiding police departments on cold cases, and has brought comfort to families experiencing tragedy such as the relatives of victims of 9/11, those who lost children in the Sandy Hook tragedy and those dealing with unexplained passings.
During the past handful of years, he began getting calls from Hollywood to appear on reality television shows about ghost hunting — one was about him helping people with dating.
“I just wanted to help the normal, average, everyday person,” he said.
Then he got a call from MGM’s Evolution Media to do a show about his own life. Within two weeks, he was shooting “Meet the Frasers.” That was three years ago. The show premieres next year and follows the 28-year-old and his Rhode Island family.
In the cast are his girlfriend Alexa Papigiotis, who is also his assistant; his mother, Angela, who is his office manager; and his father, Rod, a retired navy captain and decorated fire commissioner who is skeptical of psychics.
“He’s afraid of what I do,” Fraser said of his father. “I wear sparkly shoes — there’s nothing spooky about me.”
In fact, his readings provide the opposite experience. “I want people to laugh and celebrate life,” he said.
He believes we all have psychic abilities and it’s a matter of whether we choose to acknowledge what we’re feeling.
“Everyone has a way to connect,” said Fraser, “whether through signs, feelings, smells, dreams. It’s a language.”
His process during a group reading is unique.
“Normally (in a reading) you see a medium on-stage and there’s someone with the name John coming through who passed of a heart attack connecting to someone in the audience,” he said. “I see loved ones standing behind people in the audience. I can’t stand on-stage — I need to run to them (to deliver the message).”
Sometimes, he will hear the name of the spirit and when they passed as well as other names and places. Other times, he’ll feel how the person passed because he will experience physical symptoms.
“When I’m talking to (a spirit) of a person who was a smoker, I can’t swallow and my throat is dry during the session,” he said. “That’s just the way they communicate.”
The group reading at the Latchis Theatre is an event that was rescheduled — Fraser was filming his reality show and had to cancel the last date there. After a brief introduction about his life, Fraser will deliver messages for the entire two-hour reading. Not everyone in the audience will receive a direct message, but he said all can benefit from it.
“We can all laugh together and enjoy in this experience,” he said. “It’s about relating.”
The series, titled “Meet the Frasers,” follows Rhode Island local celebrity couple Matt Fraser, a 28-year-old psychic medium and Alexa Papigiotis, his 21-year-old pageant queen girlfriend. “Meet the Frasers” will showcase the duo’s lives, careers, and their highly involved extended families.
The half-hour sitcom is produced by MGM’s Evolution Media and is set to premiere in 2020.
“This series offers a hilarious look inside a loving, dynamic and always outspoken family,” said Amy Introcaso-Davis, executive vice president of development and production at E!. “Matt and Alexa are homegrown celebrities on the rise, with personalities big enough to take over the small city of Cranston, Rhode Island and beyond.”
According to E!, the duo is recognized everywhere from they go in Cranston, at least partly because they’re often seen in an SUV branded with Fraser’s face and name. The twosome is climbing their way to the top, with the biggest challenge being the opinionated loved ones who want to have a say in everything they do.
Other family members who will appear in the series include Maria Fraser, Matt’s witty, cynical younger sister and Angela, Matt’s mother who is a psychic herself and serves as her son’s office manager.
He’s a narcissistic psychic medium. She’s a marriage-hungry beauty queen. Together they are the power duo of Meet the Frasers, a newly ordered let’s-follow-that-wacky-family reality sitcom from E!
“Dating a psychic with a crazy Italian family is definitely not easy,” Alexa Papigiotis tells the camera as we see images of his home life in the not-sprawling not-metropolis of Cranston, RI.
Also along for the ride are Matt’s cynical younger sister Maria, who’s the voice of reason; their mom Angela, also a psychic (of course); their father Rod, a retired Navy man and ex-Fire Commissioner who’s just not that into the whole psychic thing; Alexa’s mom Sharon, who agrees that these crazy kids need to get married and start a family ASAP; Alexa’s younger sister Ava, “a beautifully put together perfectionist”; and Alexa and Ava’s stepfather Anthony, a retired nightclub owner and self-proclaimed former mobster who only has eight toes. OK.
They’re all one big, happy not-quite-a-family.
Set to premiere in 2020, Meet the Frasers is produced by Evolution Media. Mark Burnett, Barry Poznick, Douglas Ross, Alex Baskin, Lisa Tucker, Brian McCarthy and Meredith Prunkard serving as executive producers.
Alexa Papigiotis and Matt Fraser are not your average small-town couple.
“Dating a psychic with a crazy Italian family…is definitely not easy,” confirms the 21-year-old pageant queen in this exciting first look clip from E!’s new reality series Meet the Frasers, officially set for a 2020 premiere. Sitting beside Alexa on a couch in Cranston, Rhode Island, is Matt—AKA psychic boyfriend—who doesn’t argue with her about that.
The banter kicks up shortly after, as the clip cuts to a fleeting shot of Matt admiring his outfit in the reflection of a full-length mirror. “I look orgasmic!” he exclaims.
“I think you’re obsessed with yourself,” his girlfriend calls out from the next room, though the former Miss Teen Rhode Island still thinks they’re the “perfect couple.”
“Well, that’s not true because I still can’t s–t in front of her,” Matt sighs, and this time it’s Alexa who has no comment.
Dying for more cross-talk zingers from the likes of these two? Great. Because, while the 28-year-old medium is up to his ears in professional ventures right now—including but not limited to a sophomore book deal with publishing house Gallery Books, set to release his collection of life lessons, When Heaven Calls, next spring—Meet the Frasers will primarily spotlight the voices at play in Matt’s personal life. And it sounds like they mostly belong to his (very outspoken) immediate family.
The upcoming 30-minute, sitcom-style show will feature a boisterous cast of characters, all of whom are related to either Matt or Alexa. On Matt’s side, there’s younger sister Maria Fraser, a quick-witted cynic with wisdom to share, mom Angela Fraser, a psychic herself who doubles as her son’s manager and dad Rod Fraser, a retired Navy Captain and Fire Commissioner who’s skeptical about this whole “communicating with the nether realm” thing, which should be interesting.
On Alexa’s side, there’s “perfectionist” little sister Ava Papigiotis, who’s helping her sibling get prepped for the big Miss Rhode Island pageant, mom Sharon Ciolli, who (much like Alexa herself) thinks Matt and her eldest should tie the knot ASAP and stepdad Anthony Ciolli, a retired nightclub owner and self-proclaimed “former mobster” who only has eight toes. And more on that in the new year!
“This series offers a hilarious look inside a loving, dynamic and always outspoken family,” E! Executive Vice President of Development and Production Amy Introcaso-Davis said in a statement. “Matt and Alexa are homegrown celebrities on the rise, with personalities big enough to take over the small city of Cranston, Rhode Island, and beyond.”
Get to know Meet the Frasers‘ leading duo—and catch a glimpse of the “big personalities” in store come 2020—in the full sneak peek video above!
