I was just looking through our James Franco archives to figure out when I checked out on Franco as a person/artist. I barely covered him for years, and then I covered two stories about him in 2016… so I’ll say that I checked out on Franco, for the most part, about four or five years ago. I just got sick of him, I got sick of his “artist” persona, I got sick of many chances he got even after he f–ked up multiple times, and I just got sick of his bulls–t. It stopped being funny a long time ago, and I wasn’t here for the Golden Globes celebrating his movie, The Disaster Artist. A weird thing happened in the middle of the Globes too – people began calling him out. Ally Sheedy tweeted-and-deleted some #MeToo statements about Franco. People dusted off those stories about Franco pursuing underage girls. And now some wonder if it’s Franco’s moment in the Sex Predatorgate Era.
As James Franco was accepting his Golden Globe on Sunday night for Best Actor in a Musical or Comedy, Twitter started buzzing with several women accusing him of sexual misconduct. Now, two days later, the New York Times has canceled a TimesTalk event with the actor. “The event was intended to be a discussion of the making of the film, The Disaster Artist,” the Times said in a statement. “Given the controversy surrounding recent allegations, we’re no longer comfortable proceeding in that vein.”
After Franco won his Golden Globe, actress Ally Sheedy posted a few since-deleted tweets about Franco, one of which said, “James Franco just won. Please never ask me why I left the film/tv business.” Multiple other women made specific claims about Franco mistreating them. One of them, going by the name Violet Paley on Twitter, said, “Cute #TIMESUP pin James Franco. Remember the time you pushed my head down in a car towards your exposed penis & that other time you told my friend to come to your hotel when she was 17? After you had already been caught doing that to a different 17 year old?”
Franco has previously discussed one incident in which he flirted with an “almost” 18-year-old girl via social media and offered to get a room for the two of them to spend time together. That was in 2014, and at the time he apologized for his “bad judgment,” calling the situation “embarrassing.”
It’s remarkable how many of these guys there are, hiding in plain sight, right? Before Sex Predatorgate, guys like James Franco could operate under the public veneer of “oh, he’s just a complicated artist,” and “oh, he’s just baked all the time” and “don’t you understand, everything he does is just high-level performance art?” Sexual assault is not performance art. I’m glad the New York Times pre-emptively canceled this TimesTalk event, and I will patiently await the other shoe to drop.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
Or not so patiently lol. He’s always perturbed me.
Me too. He’s yet another one that I am not shocked about.
Yeah, I always felt he was arrogant and dirty. A poseur with connections.
Franco gave an interview recently, during which he said that he doesn’t look at pornography and despises that industry. I was impressed and wanting to believe him; but ultimately skeptical that it was a last-minute attempt to re-brand himself.
I mean that can still be true. Doesnt mean he isnt a predator.
There was a story on blindgossip. I think he is very much like Affleck.
I think he is worse than Affleck, or both Afflecks. But my point was simply that you can loathe porn and still be a predator.
@ QueenB exactly…you can loathe porn and still be a predator. @ Milla he’s worse than Ben Affleck, that’s a definite. I’ve never heard any stories about Ben harassing or attempting to assault underage girls. Jury’s out who’s worse…Casey or James but I’m sliding towards James Franco.
Terry Richardson has said the exact same thing before.
So did my ex-boss, who recently went away for kiddie porn, whoops.
Lol he himself shot it.
Surprised it took this long.
I thought he was gay. My B.
That was a label he ‘conveniently’ used for a while… *facepalm*
Its disgusting how he used that to get press.
So did I, but I had second hand knowledge of that from a friend who swore while he was a script person the set of first Spiderman that Franco was gay from personal experience. Maybe he’s bi?
The New York Times, New Yorker… the journalists are the ones following though on this time’s up momentum better that celebrities who came up with it…again only after this predatorgate was exposed by media. We just had a very heated debate at my house after the Globes whether the all mighty O who owns a TV channel could not have raised this issue earlier. Long story short, my husband thinks Hollywood is a bunch of hypocrites.
In terms of Franco brothers, they both give me the creeps. Since Dave is married to Alison Brie I hope he is not a douch because he certainly gives me those vibes, but James… the rumours are out there. He IS that self involved artist who thinks all means are justified for art. I am sure that now that he is in the middle of the campaign for his movie, some terrible stories will come out.
How exactly does he think that would have worked?
And how can you complain about Times Up not having any momentum when it was only unveiled last week? They did a great job creating momentum. But comparing them to investigative journalists is like comparing apples and oranges. Are you saying that Oprah et al should have been just naming names? Of women who maybe weren’t ready to come forward? Of execs who would sue them into oblivion because they were publicly stating second hand information?
I agree Bridget.
Of course the journalists are pushing it further. That’s their job.
Entertainers are not journalists, and I can’t get on board with saying “why didn’t so and so say or do something sooner”, because we know why. Threats, intimidation, careers ruined, victims punished even further, women not being believed, etc.
Yep, both are creepy. That pairing easily put me off Disaster Artist, although either of them would have been enough to do the job.
Dave is absolutely, unacceptably awful in Easy.
See I would have guessed he was one of the many who were abused as they entered the business. You never know.
I read Ally Sheedy’s tweets and I wasn’t a fan of the way she called him out. It was vague in that attention-grabby way. You know something is being insinuated, but not exactly what happened. I don’t need details, but I would have preferred something like, “He has made inappropriate advances towards me” or something to that affect.
Also WHY do people tweet then delete? It’s the internet. That’s another way to get on my nerves.
Nevertheless, good for her and all the other women for coming forward. Glad something is being done about this. He’s someone that’s had that creep vibe for a while. Still can’t believe he won an award.
I tweet and delete over typos… or because I’m emotionally driven to say something, but realize I am not ready to handle and fallout of backlash from it.
Yeah, I post and delete for that second reason all the time. Or I think better of it after the first initial emotional rush.
A wise man once told me to always make a rough draft that you do not send, when writing something in a moment of intense emotion. Then go back to it the next day and decide if you still want to send it. I don’t always follow this…but I wish I did.
Disappointed in Franco and I fear who else will be outed next. I am very proud of the women/men speaking out.
From a typo and average person standpoint I get this. But as a celebrity, public figure, or anyone with a higher profile, people screen shot things, news articles get written, etc.. VERY RARELY does someone tweet and delete no evidence of said tweet exists. Thus, the damage has already been done, so to speak. This is just a phrase, I don’t actually care about Franco’s career.
I didn’t see her tweets or anything but I assume people delete because of harassment? Or would that not make a difference on a platform like Twitter? I don’t use it but I’ve heard horror stories about harassment on there
I replied to FLORC’S comment about, so I’ll just copy paste here:
“From a typo and average person standpoint I get this. But as a celebrity, public figure, or anyone with a higher profile, people screen shot things, news articles get written, etc.. VERY RARELY does someone tweet and delete no evidence of said tweet exists. Thus, the damage has already been done, so to speak. This is just a phrase, I don’t actually care about Franco’s career.”
I guess she had a visceral reaction…the thing is though, I’m sure many men have stories about them pending. But journalists won’t move forward with just one person if the story doesn’t check out fully. Supposedly, there were some 20 men in Congress who are being worked on, but nothing has surfaced yet. And it may never.
He’s always come off odd to me. Creepy and sleazy. He’s rebranded himself before and Successfully too. As long as hes still profitable. As long as he still has Rogan in his corner. He won’t be touched. Until association to Franco hurts them, they will protect him.
It bothers me that Rogen is in corner…I watched the Globes speech and it creeped me out. My bf says the exact same thing I say…he’s a jerk…comes off very creepy. Not sure how Rogen doesn’t see it?
No one in NYC is surprised in the least
I believe a bigger story will be coming out soon…
This is not exactly surprising. He tried to pick up a teenage girl over social media, then blamed her when she published the interaction.
I saw this on Variety this morning with a ton of dudes defending his actions as normal and calling the women accusing him “hysterical”. They just don’t get it and they never will unless they are ever in a similar situation. No empathy at all, no, worse, they immediately jump on the women and blame them. It’s infuriating.
That seems super fishy though. I don’t know the exact format this event was supposed to be but I assume at least one journalist would’ve been present? I get it when people don’t want Kevin Spacey in their movie but the solution to the problem is NOT jounalists not talking to accused celebrities. Am I missing something?
It was supposed to be an event focusing on the movie The Disaster Artist. So I actually agree with them cancelling if the intended objective of discussing and promoting the film would be overshadowed by questions about these allegations. The Times is acknowledging that they can’t have him in front of them and NOT ask the questions, but that this wasn’t supposed to be the hard hitting forum to do so.
Dave Franco is and has always been the superior – and funnier – Franco. James was cancelled when he tried to pedo on that 17 year old chick from Insta.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5253271/James-Franco-denies-sexual-assault-claims-Late-Show.html
Colbert asked him about it last night.
Wow. GUILTY-mother****, he has been caught and hasn’t fully practiced how to answer being called on it, isn’t that special? He’s done these things but hasn’t prepared for being held accountable for his mistakes. Must be nice to be a good looking (+talented, he was really something in The Disaster Artist) white man. Enough.
Do you remember 2014?
Let me remind you –
http://gawker.com/james-franco-tried-to-hook-up-with-a-17-year-old-on-ins-1557491436
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2596113/James-Franco-35-hits-schoolgirl-17-Instagram-series-texts.html
I’m not sayin’, I’m just sayin’.
What a freaking creeper -that can’t have been the only time he tried to make serious arrangements to meet with someone so young. My mega young sister and her friends are pretty active on social media and have a raging crush on the guy. They sent him friend requests, or whatever you call it on Instagram and he reached out to all of them. No personal messages, I don’t think, but the creepy factor is real with this one.
ABOUT TIME! Another well known “secret” is his deplorable behavior AND that of his brother. He make my skin literally crawl.
There was a blind item about an event that made me laugh. Maybe it’s true, probably not, but it made me laugh. It was about how the blinder HIMMMMM and Edgar Ramirez trolled the crap out of Franco at a social event (where Franco was on his gross flirty self-important cloud nine) by having Ramirez walk up to Franco and “warning him” about the hordes of journalists outside who were hunting for Franco’s statement about his sex abuse and skeezy behaviour, and Franco allegedly just went white in the face and bailed. Turns out there were no journalists aside from a few TMZ guys.
I hope it’s true. Because that way Franco’s reaction speaks loud. No, it screams. And it made me laugh.
I too thought he was gay or bi as well and always wondered if he had ever been abused around the time we were talking about Bryan Singer preying on young male actors on the come up in Hollywood a la Renfro. I didn’t like how vague Sheedy’s tweet was either because the first lumped him and Christian Slater together leaving me clueless as to what they did. I did notice that the second tweet only acknowledged Franco but not Slater which was weird to me. Franco showed us the signs that he had a thing for young girls when he ‘accidentally’ hit on a teenage girl on social media smh…
I’m just wondering when Hollywood will stop fostering the talent of known sexual predators simply for the sake of them being talented and instead give more time and protections to women and promoting diversity in film and tv. When Hollywood awards The Casey Afflecks, Francos, and Harvey Weinsteins it makes them feel invincible and makes Hollywood’s public shows of support for organizations like Times Up seem hollow and insincere.
I stopped following him after that time he histed the Oscars, when he was so unprofessional. Poor Anne Hathaway had clearly put in the work… only to see all the jokes fall flat because Franco was too stoned to do his part.
Yes. That was inexcusable. He signed up to do a job then totally bailed on effort. It was appalling to leave Hathaway hanging like that in front of millions, not to mention totally disrespectful of the audience.
It really was, and of course people bashed her for being too hyper. She was trying to stay afloat with a big fat dead weight around her neck!
Isn’t this why he adores academia? It’s a large pool of available women who will be impressed by his bs.
So far 3 women have stepped up
https://www.therichest.com/buzz/james-franco-teen-harrass/
What we know of him is icky, but not illegal if I remember correctly. However, I think the Times did the right thing in cancelling. The talk was supposed to be about the movie, and this would have derailed the discussion (a la Dustin Hoffman, which still amazes me at the sheer arrogance of assuming that Oliver wouldn’t bring something like that up).
He sent “sexy” (in quotes bc he looked near death in those pics) pics to an underage girl. That’s illegal enough for me…quite frankly I’m sick of all the breaking down of categories and the “well this isn’t as bad as that” crap that’s been going on. It only serves to divide the victims. Sexual violence spans a spectrum and just bc someone “isn’t actively raping people” doesn’t excuse any of this behavior. IT ALL NEEDS TO END.
If I remember correctly, 17 was the age of consent where it took place. Extremely distasteful, but not illegal. For the purposes of an expose, that does matter.
Most people that speak out the most against porn are either really just ashamed of their intense porn habit or possibly victims of someone else having an intense porn habit and using them as a mastubatory tool.
Kirk Douglas was given a standing ovation even though there is a rumor he raped a sixteen year old Natalie Wood.It may have just been a rumor but I still don’t believe he should have been honored at this particular ceremony because the story is out there and has not been disputed.
Maybe they decided to honor him cause he is like 100 or smh and that rumor is not supported by anything else? Their way of thinking? I mean the audience there was sort of hypocritical in general.
Probably but unfortunately Natalie isn’t around to say if that rumor is true or not true.I just don’t believe with the message of that ceremony and with the speculation he did rape a sixteen year old he should have been honored at that event.
Even discounting the Natalie Wood rumor (because it is just a rumor, even if there’s a decent argument to be made) the dude is TERRIBLE when it comes to women. Violence thy name is Kirk Douglas. There’s a reason why everyone in that family is so screwed up. He should NOT have been on that stage.
Can’t stand him.
I find the whole Disaster Artist thing immensely distasteful. It sort of feels very exploitative of Tommy Wisseau — even if he seems to be in on the joke. I haven’t seen the film, but the whole narrative seems to be about what a joke this guy is because he took himself too seriously. The whole thing makes me uncomfortable.
And you would be wrong.
Ooookay, could you follow up with why you think so?
He won the golden globe for best actor in a musical? I still wonder about who made this call. Just think, on one side we have Hugh Jackman, an amazing man and actor, and then there’s sketchy douchebag here.. btw I was never into his acting or appeal.. I don’t get why people like him.
He is gross and I bet all kinds of stories are going to come out about him. He comes across as being in love with himself. I hope he never gets to make another movie!
It’s weirdhow musical and comedy are lumped together. His movie was a comedy apparently.
Friend of a film school friend knows him and said he is a total weirdo creep. He apparently will just awkwardly stare at someone and not say a wors then walk away. I think his good looks hide a totally socially awkward and creepy personality
If the Golden Globes showed an excerpt from THE GRADUATE, it was being hypocritical. Maybe the footage wasn’t in the actual show and I saw it in some pre-GG show hosted by Debra Messing. Anyway, stories have swirled around James for years. Where there is proverbial smoke, there is proverbial fire. Wonder how many people remember my heroine, Deanna Kizis? She had the guts to write an expose circa 1999 about John Cusack weirdly sniffing her armpits on their first date; how he complimented her behind in a pair of jeans; and how she had to drive on their first date because he refused (plus, he told her they had to date in a more remote place than the WeHo area because he would be recognized there). It was a great, insightful article written with just the right ingredients to make you believe it actually happened, as told by Deanna. Then the magazine who published Deanna’s tale of her strange date with Cusack didn’t include his name and used a picture of George Clooney to imply he was the real armpit whiffer. Clooney made a joke out of it, saying his mom and dad had called him in disbelief and that the magazine had “f…d him without even sending flowers.” My point is Deanna was brave to write what she did when she did, only for it then to be whitewashed and watered down to ridiculously inaccurate gossip. It really has taken this long to build the small army that is finally in place to fight back on all fronts by coming forward. (Don’t know why I bother to post other than I guess I like being a thread killer at heart.)