James Franco

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

For those who don't know, James Franco, movie star, has also become a modern-day renaissance man of sorts. Along with acting he paints, writes (has one book of short stories published) and is currently studying to receive a PhD in English.

From Wikipedia:

Franco has been described as having "an unusually high metabolism for productivity...a superhuman ability to focus".[1] Dissatisfied with his career's direction,[1] Franco reenrolled at UCLA in the fall of 2006 as an English major with a creative writing concentration. Having received permission to take as many as 62 course credits per quarter compared to the normal limit of 19[81] while continuing to act, he received his undergraduate degree in June 2008 with a GPA over 3.5.[81][1][82] For his degree, Franco prepared his departmental honors thesis as a novel under the supervision of Mona Simpson.[1][83] He moved to New York to simultaneously attend graduate school at Columbia University's MFA writing program, New York University's Tisch School of the Arts for filmmaking,[84][85][86][87] and Brooklyn College for fiction writing,[81] while occasionally commuting to North Carolina's Warren Wilson College for poetry.[1] He received his MFA from Columbia in 2010.[88] Franco is a Ph.D. student in English at Yale University[89] and will also attend the Rhode Island School of Design.[1]

Franco developed an aptitude for art—painting in particular—during his high school years while attending the California State Summer School for the Arts (CSSSA).[12] Franco has said painting was the "outlet" he needed in high school, and he "has actually been painting longer than he has been acting."[90] His paintings were displayed publicly for the first time at the Glü Gallery in Los Angeles, California, from January 7, 2006, through February 11, 2006.[12][91] Franco can also be seen painting in a scene in Spider-Man 3.[92] He launched his first European art exhibition in 2011 at Peres Projects in Berlin.[66]

Franco enjoys reading on the set of his films. Pineapple Express producer Judd Apatow has said of him: "He's a very education-minded person. We used to laugh because in between takes he'd be reading The Iliad on set. We still haven't read The Iliad. It was a very difficult book. With him, it was always James Joyce or something."[93]

I have mixed feelings on Franco's educational endeavors. First, I wonder how much of his celebrity he is using as cache to get through the seemingly super-human work load he takes on. I also admire him for it, though, as it's pretty obvious he is doing it out of a passion for the subject--he doesn't need to worry about pursuing a career for money. He doesn't seem to be faking it. Reading The Iliad on a film set seems like quite a lot of work just for the sake of posturing.

I do like to see the academic field, especially since it's English, get such a "cool" representative. He is definitely not an intellectual pinhead. I think it's cool that younger kids may see him doing these things and not look at higher education as something just for the ultra-smart, or nerds.

So, anyways, I kind of came in here starting this subject with no clear direction. What do you think? Do you think he's sincere? Do you think he's a positive example of higher learning? I'm also curious if anyone has read his book, and what they think of it.

[OrphanPip]

You think that's trippy, Natalie Portman is a published scientist, she had 2 papers published as a research assistant when she studied psychology at Harvard.

[Cunninglinguist]

From this point of view he doesn't look superhumanly impressive - he's going to college as a 28 year old whose already read a ton of literature.. of course he can go through the material 4x faster, he's spent the last 10 years reading the stuff! So I think he's sincere; but he shows up smarter than he actually is. To some extent it's expected - society privileges certain people so that they can become icons, and it seems like he's been selected as one of them.


You think that's trippy, Natalie Portman is a published scientist, she had 2 papers published as a research assistant when she studied psychology at Harvard.

Well Natalie Portman is just amazing xD

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

You think that's trippy, Natalie Portman is a published scientist, she had 2 papers published as a research assistant when she studied psychology at Harvard.
Yes, I know. I love her. Literally when I was younger. I had a huuuuge crush on her when that travesty The Phantom Menace came out. Her being so smart just makes her that much hotter.

From this point of view he doesn't look superhumanly impressive - he's going to college as a 28 year old whose already read a ton of literature.. of course he can go through the material 4x faster, he's spent the last 10 years reading the stuff! So I think he's sincere; but he shows up smarter than he actually is. To some extent it's expected - society privileges certain people so that they can become icons, and it seems like he's been selected as one of them.
Maybe. I don't know though. I don't care how much you read, college courses aren't easy. At least they aren't for me. He still needs to put in the work (unless you believe there is some nefarious conspiracy in his intellectual pursuits, which I don't).

[OrphanPip]

I don't think he actually works as often as it seems, like it only takes a month to film a movie really, and he hasn't done any big parts in years. Probably fits most of it in over the summer.

As to Natalie:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KpMPFGBtE7Q

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

"I'll sit right down on your face, and take a ****!" :lol:

[Emmy Castrol]

James Franco is definately good-looking... if nothing else....

[JBI]

That's what you get for having grade inflation - educational inflation. Seriously, that doesn't impress me; many artists didn't have formal educations in 5 different universities and produced good enough art.

[Lokasenna]

Is it me, or does the producer fellow in the wikipedia article you quote seem to be suggesting that James Joyce wrote The Illiad?

If it's a genuine desire to learn, then all power to him. I must admit, making a point of reading high-brow literature on set does seem slightly posturing. It's like the people you find on trains, who sit there reading Rushdie (or similar) who keep glancing up in the hope that you'll engage them in conversation about how clever they look.

[MorpheusSandman]

I saw him on The Colbert Report and he seemed genuine enough about his pursuits, but he also made a good point about how today's society and, especially, Hollywood actors are so culturally destitute, in general, that it would make anyone who pursued academia seem like a "Renaissance Man". It'd be nice if he could bring some publicity and coolness to art and literature and higher education, in general. I never went to college myself, so I have no idea how impressive what he's doing is, but if he is indeed doing it for the right reasons then I can't help but applaud him.

[Cunninglinguist]

Maybe. I don't know though. I don't care how much you read, college courses aren't easy. At least they aren't for me. He still needs to put in the work (unless you believe there is some nefarious conspiracy in his intellectual pursuits, which I don't).

A lot less work, though. If he's taking 3x the normal amount of classes he obvious isn't going to every one of them - more like he's mainly just showing up for tests. All in all, he's probably gifted, but he's no genius (neither is Portman, I suspect). I question how privileged he is. That he was allowed to take that many credits as a mature student (or any kind of student, for that matter) is abnormal. Getting into the Yale grad program with a 3.5 GPA from UCLA (especially as an English major) is quite rare, I imagine. I suspect we tend to give him the benefit of the doubt because we want smart & sexy icons. And, to top it off, he just appears so well on paper. He breaks a stereotype with such apparent ease, he must be the next Einstein, eh? But people haven't considered all the circumstances.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

It'd be nice if he could bring some publicity and coolness to art and literature and higher education, in general.
My thoughts exactly.

[ChicagoReader]

@OrphanPip, really? Franco has done more than a handful of movies in the past few years: Howl, Pineapple Express, 127 hours, Milk, etc. With that and 60+ credit hours in a single semester I don't care if he gets privileges that's still impressive

[OrphanPip]

@OrphanPip, really? Franco has done more than a handful of movies in the past few years: Howl, Pineapple Express, 127 hours, Milk, etc. With that and 60+ credit hours in a single semester I don't care if he gets privileges that's still impressive

Ya, but several of those movies he's in for only a few minutes, and like I said it doesn't actually take that much time to film a part in a movie. His only really major part out of those is 127 Hours, and Howl.

And it's not that impressive, loads of people work full time jobs while doing school full time, some even raise kids and worry about where their next meal is coming from. Their jobs don't usually involving sitting around in trailer doing nothing most of the day either.

Edit: Also, Franco had started his degree in '96, so he likely had some transfer credits. He cut a year off his education, that's not that unusual.

[lowradiation]

He's clearly gifted as he wouldn't be where he is, so credit to him for persuing education despite probably being able to settle on his hollywood career. I mean why would someone commit to so much work, travelling and time consumption just as a bit of a 'look at me i'm hip'.

Heard is debut book was pretty hit and miss, as expected. Fair on him I guess, he clearly has the money, rather see it go on that than 7 gram rocks every weekend.

Also: I am completely lost when it comes to the American education system (I'm from England, not just an idiot), anyone care to explain what all the little numbers mean?

[Armel P]

You think that's trippy, Natalie Portman is a published scientist, she had 2 papers published as a research assistant when she studied psychology at Harvard.

I don't find that particularly impressive. My girlfriend got on 5 papers without even having had a Master's degree. Just seeing how things work in labs through her I can't be that amazed by it. It's cool but not THAT special.

I'm more impressed by a book of short stories because I know I probably can't do that.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I don't find that particularly impressive. My girlfriend got on 5 papers without even having had a Master's degree. Just seeing how things work in labs through her I can't be that amazed by it. It's cool but not THAT special.
Well, I guess most don't know how hard it is to get your name on a published studies. I just find it more odd than impressive. Odd in a good way, though.

He's clearly gifted as he wouldn't be where he is, so credit to him for persuing education despite probably being able to settle on his hollywood career. I mean why would someone commit to so much work, travelling and time consumption just as a bit of a 'look at me i'm hip'.

Heard is debut book was pretty hit and miss, as expected. Fair on him I guess, he clearly has the money, rather see it go on that than 7 gram rocks every weekend.

Also: I am completely lost when it comes to the American education system (I'm from England, not just an idiot), anyone care to explain what all the little numbers mean?
If you mean the numbers in brackets, those are just the citation numbers from Wikipedia. They are hyperlinked on Wiki ... I was just too lazy to delete them.

Looking at the reviews of his book on Amazon, it's pretty evenly split, a bit more negative than positive. I'm tempted to read it just to make up my own mind. It's only 208 pages. Has anyone here read it? I'd love to know a lit-netter's thoughts.

[ceelo]

You kind of make it sound like, because he is an actor,.. what he is doing is somehow remarkable and other-worldly. I'm sure there are a lot of actors and actresses who share the same interests as he does, as well as people from all walks of life. It's really not that amazing or commendable.

[Tournesol]

I guess one could say it's commendable.

Because inspite of the fact that he's very wealthy, due to the many successful movies he's acted in, he still finds himself in need of pursuing an accomplishment that requires him to put out personal effort. And that, in many of the wealthy actors and actresses today, is a scarcity. For you and I who are regular joes, it doesn't seem remarkable, because we may still be looking for our little time in the spotlight, but for him, who's been there, and yet still to search for something deeper, is to me commendable.

Viggo Mortensen is also an accomplised artist. He paints and plays the violin, if I'm not mistaken.

Franco's published short stories is a great feat though, to me writing fiction is very difficult. It's easier for me to write truth in poetry than fiction in prose. I've never read Franco's stories though, to say whether they're good or not.

[Emmy Castrol]

I've been thinking about this lately and I've come to the conclusion that I find I just can't sincerely like James Franco for his 'modern renaiisance man’ achievements. I don’t really even admire or respect him that much. For one, although he has been in several movies (and I really like Tristan and Isolde the film, but not as much as the Diana L. Paxton written interpretation) I’ve always thought he was a very average actor. I mean, he does a passable and convincing enough job but nothing that suggests to me that he puts his entire being into his roles, like Christian Bale or Leonardo DiCaprio.

I found this short story of his, Just before the Black, http://www.esquire.com/fiction/james-franco-fiction-0410-2 (assuming it is him) and I have to say I found it very average. It’s good enough to be considered publishable quality but similar to his acting, it seems to lack him. Despite what some critics may say about his work being raw (this is only short story I’ve read of his and I don’t find it raw, it’s polished enough) I feel it’s more like he is holding the real part of him back because – as everyone knows – it’s very vulnerable to reveal to the public what you are and what you really want.

When I say average, I don’t mean in talent, he is clearly clever. I mean average in an artistic sense, I think he lacks a style, an individual writing voice… but then again, I am not too fond of the style of writing he writes in (considering all his stories are written in the same style and voice as Just before the Black) so it could be my personal bias.

You know, I'd have more respect for Franco if he chose to publish his short stories under a pseudonym… and I don’t think being clever or smart is enough to make a good role model. Obedience and honesty are preferable qualities in a person…

I wouldn’t be surprised if his paintings are very average too. I hope I am not coming across as having tall poppy syndrome, I just don’t think he deserves special treatment just because he is famous. Anyway I can’t help it, we don’t have much of a celebrity-worship culture in Australia…

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

His paintings are laughably horrible.

http://james-franco.com/james/art-gallery/

[Emmy Castrol]

Oh I just know he's going to look back on them in thirty years time and cringe...

(or perhaps I just know nothing about painting art, I can accept that too)

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Yeah. I've lost a little respect for him after looking at those.

[Lokasenna]

Woo, those are really, really awful.

I mean, even I could do better than that... and I find stickmen hard...

[prince of swat]

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[Drkshadow03]

Woo, those are really, really awful.

I mean, even I could do better than that... and I find stickmen hard...

But . . . the website called them magnificent, so they must be . . .

[lowradiation]

What on earth are those paintings??

I'm all for openmindedness and no expert on painting by any means, but christ they look horrendous.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Can we get StLukes in here to tear them apart? :lol:

[Lokasenna]

But . . . the website called them magnificent, so they must be . . .

Gosh... something untrue on the internet? Whodathunkit?

:lol:

[Tournesol]

His paintings are laughably horrible.

http://james-franco.com/james/art-gallery/

OK, for starters, I have to recall one time in my childhood:

I was about 6 yrs old, and I had done an interpretation of cinderella, with her long braid hanging out of the tower window, and the prince sitting on his horse below, looking up at her. I kid you not when I say that that drawing that I had done when I was 6, is WAY, WAY better than any of those things that Franco calls art.

OMG, I'm sorry, but...did he close his eyes while painting those things? Isn't he ashamed of torturing the world with such childish depictions of nightmares?!

[Lokasenna]

For the purpose of showing what James Franco is up against in the showbiz world, have a look at some of the painting by everyone's favourite threatening Welshman, Sir Anthony Hopkins:

Renaissance Man: Anthony Hopkins (http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/gallery/2010/jan/21/paintings-anthony-hopkins-art#/?picture=358344968&index=0)

Sorry about the naffness of the link - the Guardian was the best source I could find for some of his art. Now, I'm no expert on art, but I would rather have one of Sir Anthony's works hanging above the fireplace than anything of James Franco. They seem much more aesthetically pleasing, and of a much higher artistic calibre.

[FROADS]

^ I dig Hopkins's paintings. I'd buy one.

How old was James Franco when he created those pieces? Really awful. You could cross off painter from his Renaissance profile.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I like Hopkin's stuff. Very cool looking. Still, not something I'd buy. I know the "I could do it" argument is a stupid one (as in he did it and I didn't so it's irrelevant), but, personally, I like art that is something I couldn't do on a technical level. I could do those.

The thing with Franco's stuff is that it's been done before, a long, long time ago. Plus, in my opinion, an artist needs to establish that he has good technical ability before he does crap like that. I have a suspicious feeling that Franco's full ability might be on display.

[stlukesguild]

Following WWII there was a movement toward an extremely crude, brutal, art that rejected any appearance of artfulness, sophistication, or aesthetic finesse. Not unlike the similar Dada movement following WWI, the aim was to reject anything that bespoke of the culture that had allowed for the horrors of the recently ended war. Artists embraced the look of graffiti, childrens art, and the art of the mentally ill. Painters such as Karel Appel, a member of the CoBrA (Coppenhagen, Brussels, Amsterdam) produced paintings that made Picasso's work appear polished and sophisticated:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5061/5641538913_0e107c405b.jpg

Jean Dubuffet may have been the central figure of the "brutal" art style known as "Art Brut", a term he coined. Dubuffet rejected all that spoke of fine art to him... even Picasso, Matisse, and Modernism. Instead he collected the art of "outsiders": the mentally ill and handicapped and the self-taught... his collection eventually forming the basis for the first museum of "outsider art":

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5110/5641538783_1145fb1300_b.jpg

In the 1980s, a young, upper-middle-class black artist by the name of Jean-Michel Basquiat began to gain notoriety for a body of work which built upon the Art Brut of Dubbuffet, the graffiti of New York City, and the raw energy and anger of Hip Hop culture. Basquiat was soon embraced by the bottom feeders of the art world (Andy Warhol, Mary Boone, etc...) as the "great black hope". Fame and all that came with it (money, sex, drugs, sycophants) came too fast for Basquiat who rapidly became addicted to heroin and began churning out endless paintings to multiple dealers to feed his habit (One, Mary Boone, reportedly locked him in her basement for a period where she kept him supplied with food, water, and heroin in return for a steady flow of paintings!!!:eek:). As might be expected, Basquiat died well before his time from a drug overdose.

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5185/5641538517_2a1df19e73_b.jpg

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5305/5641538245_85cb84ec7a.jpg

Basquiat had an undeniable energy... his handling of line was tense and quirky. His imagery was playfully laden with both visual and verbal puns and he had a clear eye for color and composition. What he lacked was the time needed to fully develop as an artist. In spite of this, the art world canonized him... whether out of guilt... or out of the desire to cash in on the artist who had been marketed as the great voice of urban black America. Critiv Robert Hughes wryly wrote of the manner in which the dealers portrayed Basquiat as a martyr: St. John-Michael (Jean-Michel) in his essay, Requiem for a Featherweight.

Franco's paintings are clearly pastiches of Basquiat's work... so much so that they might easily be mistaken for one of his paintings. Basquait... whatever his weaknesses... at least had an original look. There is no way that one might confuse his paintings with those of his artistic heroes: Dubuffet, Warhol, etc... Sadly, this is not so of Franco. I have even less respect for Franco when I consider that in spite of his limited experience as an artist he has rushed to embrace the style of an artist that is less than demanding. In other words... most serious artists go through the motions of learning to draw and paint academically... to a certain extent... before running off to abstraction of crude expressionism. This training allows the artist to see the formal structure that exists... even in the most apparent abstract and chaotic paintings.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

Even the though two latter paintings you show are look a lot like Franco's work, these still seem much more interesting for some indefinable reason.

[Brock]

Franco's paintings are clearly pastiches of Basquiat's work... so much so that they might easily be mistaken for one of his paintings. Basquait... whatever his weaknesses... at least had an original look. There is no way that one might confuse his paintings with those of his artistic heroes: Dubuffet, Warhol, etc... Sadly, this is not so of Franco. I have even less respect for Franco when I consider that in spite of his limited experience as an artist he has rushed to embrace the style of an artist that is less than demanding. In other words... most serious artists go through the motions of learning to draw and paint academically... to a certain extent... before running off to abstraction of crude expressionism. This training allows the artist to see the formal structure that exists... even in the most apparent abstract and chaotic paintings.

I am not claiming to know a lot about art here at all, hence the reason why I'm slightly confused. There seems - to me, at least - little sense in the claim that you need to 'go through the motions of learning to draw and paint academically' before doing something like what Franco has done. That would be similar to saying that you need to study the 'classic' poets in order to attempt poetry, or like saying that to play jazz influenced extreme noisecore, you first NEED to learn the staple ideas of music theory and the rudiments of time signatures. Why? I think I am right in saying that it has been known that musicians often create 7/4 rhythms without even knowing what a 4/4 rhythm is. Is this wrong? What if I decide to cook a really 'abstract' curry and I've no idea of how a normal curry is cooked? Does it somewhere make the 'abstractness' of the curry invalid, simply because I haven't bothered making the effort to understand the techniques of traditional curry-making beforehand? Do I really need to know the formal structures that exist? Why? Wouldn't it be better if I didn't?

What I'm getting at (silly analogies aside), is that we shouldn't snub Franco's art because we collectively agree that it looks dreadful here and now. Remember Alan Ginsberg's Howl? And how it was deemed by literature professors as not even passing as literature because it didn't fit with their ideals? Because it was a 'pastiche' of an earlier piece of literature that was considered somehow literature? Similar, you might say, to how Franco's art is a 'pastiche' of Pisquiat's art? (It is a mere (albeit fitting) coincidence that Franco actually plays the part of Ginsberg in the film Howl.)

I'm going to stick my neck out now. I, for one, admire Franco's art. I think if we stop looking at it in the 'even I could do that' and just look at it as an expression, as patterns, colours, emotions, words in images, as freedom, unconstrained, it might have more of an effect on us. It's art. In this sense, it's no longer Franco's career you're looking at. It's not something related to a backlog of art history and art theory. It's art. And why does an 'artist' have to be 'serious' in order to create art?

(PS, I'm not having a go at you stlukesguild! I am aware that you obviously know a lot more than I do about this sort of thing; I just happen to appreciate Franco's art quite a bit.)

[Cunninglinguist]

His paintings are laughably horrible.

http://james-franco.com/james/art-gallery/

I laughed so hard I lost my whole wardrobe of underpants. Yes, I do have more than 1 pair of underpants; that's just how bad his paintings are.

I most enjoy the one with the school bus in it.

[chipper]

i don't see it as laughably horrible. it's not for everyone but it's not horrible.

[Gregory Samsa]

It's horrible.

[cyberbob]

I think Franco is a medioce actor, but if he wants to be well-educated, I respect that.

Too many celebs now who are dumb as ****, think their opinions on politics and other subjects besides that of their profession are important because of their fame.

At least Franco is genuinely willing to educate himself, and doesn't seem to want to shove his views down people's throats like Sean Penn, George Clooney, Robert Redford, etc.

[Propter W.]

I don't like his "paintings", but then again, there's lots of art that is highly praised by the experts that I find absolutely horrible, ridiculous and worthless.

James Franco did a great job in 127 hours. In fact, it's one of the best performances I've seen this year.

[Alexander III]

I think Franco is a medioce actor, but if he wants to be well-educated, I respect that.

Too many celebs now who are dumb as ****, think their opinions on politics and other subjects besides that of their profession are important because of their fame.

At least Franco is genuinely willing to educate himself, and doesn't seem to want to shove his views down people's throats like Sean Penn, George Clooney, Robert Redford, etc.

Actually his role as James Dean in the biopic James Dean is absolutely brilliant. He doesn't have respect as an actor because the majority of his roles are light hearted fluff, but he definitely is a good actor. Of course he is no Colin Firth or DiCaprio...

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I think he's a good actor that has done some great roles and will probably do more. He's no Daniel Day-Lewis, though.