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New York – James Franco, actor, creative writing student, and soon-to-be published author, attended last night’s National Book Awards at Cipriani downtown, where he spent most of the evening, it appeared, basking in the attention of being the most famous person at the party: He was more recognizable than honoree Gore Vidal, more rakishly handsome than Dave Eggers, and probably richer than anyone else in the room. Franco stayed into the wee hours of the night, smiling his crinkly eyed smile at an evolving locus of giddy publishing women who trotted up to pay their respects, some of whom, as the evening grew drunker, could be seen boldly resting their hands on his famous shoulders.
And then, suddenly, at around 1 a.m., he was alone.
It’s a terrible truth that when famous people are alone, they’re more alone than normal people, because everyone is watching them be alone. Whether or not an actual spotlight came down on Franco at the moment of his abandonment is unclear — Cipriani’s lighting is very theatrical, in general — but immediately, the energy around him changed. The aura of celebrity that had protected him all evening swiftly morphed into an aura of panic, like a tropical storm cloud rolling in to darken a blue sky. He glanced around nervously, which of course only exacerbated the problem. People looked away and began to whisper. “What do we do?” New York writer Erica Orden hissed, gripping our arm urgently. “Should we talk to him?”
“About what?” I said. We could only stare, subtly.
Nearby, a group of girls jostled each other in Franco’s direction, but none went forward.
It is, of course, impossible to know what went through Franco’s mind as the seconds ticked by. Perhaps, literary young man that he is, he was trying to recall the advice Robert Benchley offered in his 1932 New Yorker essay “Filling That Hiatus” about being suddenly abandoned at a dinner party. Should he pretend he was talking to someone nearby? Start barking like a dog and crawling around on all fours? No. Franco fiddled with his wine glass. Then! Franco had a realization. Moving quickly, he reached into his pocket. The crowd held its collective breath: a cell phone! He clicked it off lock and began texting wildly. A murmuring arose: Was James Franco pretending to text in an awkward situation?!?! Corners of eyes watched curiously as Franco paused, nodded, and then, with a casual glance backward at the party — was there anyone he needed to say good-bye to? No! — headed downstairs, into the night, as though he had received a message informing him he was urgently needed somewhere else.
Above, James Franco is caught dozing off in class. He’s getting a grad school degree at Columbia University…
James Franco, still in grad school, is going to appear on a series of episode of the soap opera, General Hospital. His guest stint begins on November 20th and the network announced that James will juggle studies at Columbia University, while play a man with a lot of mystery who suddenly arrives in town.
HollywoodGossip – James Franco had a surreal experience while taking in Broadway’s dysfunctional family musical “Next to Normal” on Saturday night.The actor, who was on a break from filming “Eat Pray Love” with Julia Roberts, turned over his Playbill and saw his face plastered on the back cover. “James and [girlfriend Ahna Riley] had a giggle over that,” observed one theatergoer.But seeing his face in ads is clearly a common occurrence for the “Spider-Man” star – Franco quickly settled down to watch the show.
PEOPLE – James Franco, who had no problem milking a fake cow at Harvard in February, has bowed out of delivering a commencement speech at his own alma mater in Southern California.
The Milk and Pineapple Express star [Wait!Theres Tons More…]
“I wanted to get the most out of UCLA,” Franco says. “[My advisers] really helped me make that happen.”
UCLA academic advisers:
In many ways, James Franco ‘08 is the sort of student UCLA academic advisers work with every day.
True, not all undergrads are A-list celebrities: When Franco began taking classes again at UCLA in fall 2006 as an English major with a creative-writing concentration, the then-28-year-old, Palo Alto, Calif., native was already among the university’s most high-profile students. Even then – before Milk, before Pineapple Express, before he’d hosted Saturday Night Live – obsessively popular roles in Freaks and Geeks and Spider-Man had instilled Franco in the Young Hollywood limelight; even more, his reputation as a high-IQ hunk spanned from gossip blogs to college campuses across America, and UCLA was no exception.
“Acting kind of worked out, at least to the extent that I could make a living at it,” Franco admits, sounding almost embarrassed. “But after eight or nine years of that, I decided that I wanted something else.”
That “something else” was a return to academia. And to achieve his intellectual goals – which included taking “a lot of classes” – Franco did what any ambitious student in need of educational guidance might do: He turned to the school’s academic advisers.
Not sure if I agree, but…
James Franco was named Stoner of the Year for his portrayal of a dazed drug dealer in “Pineapple Express” at Saturday’s Stony Awards in California. The eighth-annual High Times prize-giving, which honors pro-marijuana storylines and portrayals on the big and small screen, also served up wins for Danneel Harris, who was crowned Stonette of the Year for playing Vanessa in “Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay,” and Franco’s “Pineapple Express,” which was named the past year’s Best Pot Comedy Film.
Indie movie “The Wackness” won for Best Drama, while “Weeds” picked up a trophy for Best TV Show. Upon winning his award, Franco, who insists he merely played a stoner in the film and never got high on set, told High Times reporters, “I’m so proud of this movie. It’s, like, the first movie that really kind of examines what a relationship is like between a guy and his dealer. It’s almost like a love story.”
James Franco Movie Milk – IMDB -The story of California’s first openly gay elected official, Harvey Milk, a San Francisco supervisor who was assassinated along with Mayor George Moscone by San Francisco Supervisor Dan White.After moving to San Francisco, the middle-aged New Yorker, Harvey Milk, became a Gay Rights activist and city politician. On his third attempt, he was elected to San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors in 1977, making him the first openly gay man to be elected to public office in the USA. The following year, both he and the city’s mayor, George Moscone, were shot to death by former city supervisor, Dan White, who blamed his former colleagues for denying White’s attempt to rescind his resignation from the board.
Mr. Milk had been the subject of several books and the Academy Award-winning documentary feature, The Times of Harvey Milk (1984); but Milk (2008) is the first fictional feature to explore private aspects of the man’s personal life and career.
Milk was filmed on location in San Francisco. Many of Mr Milk’s real-life surviving friends and former associates participated in the making of this film, several appearing on camera.
