James Franco Quotes

1. (on joining the drama club) It was a wonderful relief. I felt like I was stabbing my girlfriend.


2. If the work is good, what does it matter? I'm doing it because I love it. Why not do as many things I love as I can? As long as the work is good.

3. I was supposed to go out with this girl, but the plans mixed up because I was working late. So I went to her apartment with a flower. She was asleep, but I really wanted to see her. I figured I'd be like Romeo, and climbed up to her balcony and gave her a rose. She was very shocked. After that, it was over.

4. (about painting) I needed an outlet in high school and came across painting. I've actually been painting longer than I've been acting. A movie is a collaborative effort, and with painting you just have yourself.

5. (on a painting for Marla) We got in a fight and she destroyed it. I forgive her. I just haven't given her any more paintings since then.

6. I always see nice images like that but I don't know what to do with them. I guess you share them with someone. Or you write them down in a poem. I had so many of those little images, but I never shared them or wrote any of them down.

7. For me, screenwriting is an empowering process: to start from scratch and get my own ideas out there and not feel as an actor I have to step in at the very end of the process.

8. (about what he looks for in a girl) Just someone I can relate to artistically and who can also be understanding and supportive of the demands of my lifestyle.




9. Painting is wonderful because it's so private. You're not beholden to a director or a producer. But acting has been really saving to me. It's so expressive and free.

10. If I'm working on a film, I'll do sit-ups for before I shoot. Like, 100 in the morning or something.


11. I don't even like to sleep - I feel as if there's too much to do.

12. This year, I directed two low-budget feature films called "The Ape" and "Fool's Gold". They're based on two short plays I wrote with my partner Merriweather Williams, who writes for SpongeBob SquarePants. I financed them with Spider-Man money, so there was no pressure to cast anybody (we didn't want) or get investors their money back. It was really low pressure. I loved it. I even had (some crew guys) who worked on Kevin Smith's films. It's great being your own boss.

13. I worked at a McDonald's drive-through. I could always tell when girls were interested: They'd drive around again and say: "I forgot something".
 


14. Barry had done it with her, the girl I loved, and it had meant nothing to him; Tanya would die and no one would care; and there were billions of bodies alive on earth and they would all be buried and ground into dirt; and Picasso was a master at age sixteen and I was a perfect shit.

15. The new critique you're gonna start hearing about James Franco, is "He's spreading himself too thin."

16. It's hard when you're doing a film based on a true story to really figure out what all those relationships were.

17. You know, directors kind of want different things. Some of them think that if they just are always talking to you and keeping your spirits up and everything that it helps you, and then some leave you alone and give you your space.

18. This was the way the night had cashed in. Choices had been made and things happened, and here we were. It was sad, and funny. My life was made of this. Stuff like this.



19. I missed prom. My girlfriend at the time was an actress and my prom was actually on my 18th birthday, but there was also a trip to Aspen, Oregon to go see the plays. So, we opted to see the plays. We had our own little prom.

20. (on playing gay characters) It's funny because the way that kind of stuff is talked about on blogs is so black-and-white. It's all cut-and-dry identity politics. "Is he straight or is he gay?" Or: "This is your third gay movie - come out already!" And all based on, gay or straight, based on the idea that your object of affection decides your sexuality. There are lots of other reasons to be interested in gay characters than wanting myself to go out and have sex with guys. And there are also lots of other aspects about these characters that I'm interested in, in addition to their sexuality. So, in some ways it's coincidental, in other ways it's not. I mean, I've played a gay man who's living in the '60s and '70s, a gay man who we depicted in the '50s, and one being in the '20s. And those were all periods when to be gay, at least being gay in public, was much more difficult. Part of what I'm interested in is how these people who were living anti-normative lifestyles contended with opposition. Or, you know what, maybe I'm just gay.

21. I drank from the bottle again and it was a scary plunge because I always wanted to take too much. It hurt, but it was also impressive, like being in the hands of a bigger force. And because of that, a relief.








22. (on using the videos trapped hiker Aron Ralston had made, in order to portray him in "127 Hours") He's not an actor giving a Shakespeare death soliloquy. He didn't want to lose himself because that would make it harder for his mother to watch. I knew that if I captured that, somehow, it would feel very authentic and powerful.

23. When I research a role it does get a little crazy and maybe even a little stupid.









24. I still don't like going to bed alone.

25. (on accepting a position as a dramatics teacher at New York University) I've been very fortunate. I had to work hard but had opportunities to do everything that I wanted. That's one of the reasons I'm teaching. I'm trying to give back to other people. That's what I guess I want to do now - continue to be creative in a way that I can give back.

26. Gucci makes me a suit for like every single event. But I don't keep them all in my closet or anything; they hold them for me.





27. (observation while making a documentary about the porn industry) When I was young, I got a video camera and my girlfriend and I decided to film ourselves and watched it back and said: "Yeah, well, let's never watch that again". Those performers in pornos, they are great performers. They're not just doing it. They're selling it to an audience.

28. My name is James Edward Franco. Ted is a nickname for Edward. That's what my parents called me. I also got "Teddy Ruxpin" a lot. It just got to a point where I got sick of it, so when a teacher called out "James Franco" my junior year of high school, I didn't correct her.





29. Sometimes I get a little sad, and I feel like being alone. Then I talk to my cat about it, and he reminds me I'm James Franco. Then we dance.

30. I get like six or so hours of sleep a night.

31. (on being a troubled youth) I was arrested for a lot of petty crimes. It added up. I was a ward of the court and was put on probation. Finally, I'd had enough chances, but they gave me one final chance, and, fortunately, I didn't get into any trouble after that. Otherwise, I guess it could have been like Lindsay Lohan, when she's on probation and then she's accused of stealing a necklace, and it's a kind of small thing that becomes a big thing. It's like probation doesn't end.

32. Anne Hathaway is so energetic, I think the Tasmanian Devil would look stoned standing next to Anne Hathaway.

33. (on his earliest jobs) When I was 13 or 14 my dad got me a job working the counter at a coffee shop. It sucked. I read books when the place was empty and got let go when the assistant manager told the boss he'd found $2 in one of the aprons and said I was trying to steal. It turns out he had taken, like, $10,000. Later, when I wanted a car and my parents said they'd match whatever I could pay, I got a job driving carts at the Palo Alto Golf Course. I would read stuff like Naked Lunch in the cart, and they let me go when they caught me reading the sequel to A Separate Peace. Another summer I got a job with a friend on his father's construction crew, but we just got high every day...I was (also) given an internship at Lockheed Martin. But that experience showed me I never wanted to work in that environment.

34. It feels really sad, to me, to go to a dark bedroom. It's like surrendering to the night or something.










35. I don't like sleeping in a bed.

36. (on the failure of "Your Highness") I didn't write that movie. I was just doing my job. I think I'm fine in it. They knew there were problems with that movie a year ago. Just because it comes out after the Oscars, it's like "Oh, here's backlash". Well, you have the year's best actress Oscar winner in it, so wouldn't that boost ticket sales? And people want to blame me for that? It's just ridiculous. There's this feeling about me like: "He's doing too many things. Let's get him".

37. (on his tattoos) I like all of 'em. I got a lot of local references; I got to represent Florida. I got to represent the 727, you know. I got a great one that not too many people have seen because it's on my chest, but it's got a little alien stepping through a door, it's like he's coming right out.

38. (on hosting the Oscars) It's hard to talk about because it's like assigning blame - not a fun thing to do. For three or four weeks, we shot the promos and the little film that played in the opening. In the last week, when we really started focusing on the script for the live show and did a run-through, I said to the producer: "I don't know why you hired me, because you haven't given me anything. I just don't think this stuff's going to be good". After the show, everybody was so happy, and Bruce Cohen, the show's producer, hugged me and said: "Steven Spielberg just told me it was the best Oscars ever!" As far as having low energy or seeming as though I wasn't into it or was too cool for it, I thought, Okay, Anne Hathaway is going the enthusiastic route. I've been trained as an actor to respond to circumstances, to the people I'm working with, and not to force anything. So I thought I would be the straight man and she could be the other, and that's how I was trying to do those lines. I felt kind of trapped in that material. I felt: "This is not my boat. I'm just a passenger, but I'm going down and there's no way out".

39. I'm starting to teach now: I teach in the graduate film program at NYU and next year I'm going to be teaching at Los Angeles at the film program and English program at UCLA.

40. (on being a workaholic) I don't know, but the first short film I ever directed, years before I even went to film school at NYU, is about a boy who is introduced to the concept of his own mortality when his goldfish dies. He says to his parents: "I don't want to die," and though they say he shouldn't worry because there's plenty of time, they don't really comfort him. So he thinks, I have to do everything now. He gets a neighbor girl to marry him, gets a job, starts a family. Although I've changed and relaxed a bit, my behavior shows I've thought along those lines for quite a while.

41. It can be so boring being you sometimes, and if you were the most special thing like that, it could be really great, but maybe some people say the same thing about you, and you want to tell those people: "No, you're stupid, it's no fun being me".






42. (on staying out of tabloids) The paparazzi can be sharks. The new thing is they surround someone's car so they can't even move and they just take pictures of them, it's maybe mostly the girls. I'm sure people tip off the press when they're going to be somewhere but they're also hunted. I tend not to go out so they can't find me, I guess.

43. (on the show "Girls") I am fine watching a show about women dealing with men. I watched "Steel Magnolias" when I was in junior high school and I can get off on female bonding. Done right. It's more interesting than male bonding. I'm also aware that I may just be giving myself too much credit: for all I know, but for the grace of Judd Apatow, I could be just like those struggling male idiots I see on the show.

44. I'm a big cardigan sweater guy.

45. (on the moment that his successful film career failed to meet his artistic expectations) I remember getting ready to do the third "Spiderman", just thinking: I don't know if I can take it again. If I can take all the work that doesn't seem to have a payoff that is equal to the effort. As soon as I started branching out and pursuing my other interests I could say: "OK…it's a place where more earnest kinds of exploration can happen."

46. Quite Franc-ly, I think I am an asset to this world we live in. I know that if I didn't exist, there would be some truly upset people just waiting for me. A life without Franco is like a kitten without fur. That's what my reflection told me.

47. Teens today rule the world. The whole culture - movies, music - is pointed at young people. They have so "much" power.



48. There's this public persona that's "James Franco" that's half my creation but half of it isn't. Half of it's what other people write about me or how they perceive me. (His art is) a way of using…an image that other people have created and re-presenting it.

49. For whatever reason, I have an emotional life that wants to come out.






50. I needed an outlet in high school and came across painting. I've actually been painting longer than I've been acting. A movie is a collaborative effort, and with painting you just have yourself.

51. I become kind of obsessive about research.




52. They say living well is the best revenge but sometimes writing well is even better.

53. A lot of the people in San Francisco think of themselves as healers - not just as people delivering this base service, but giving their clients spiritual help. It's almost like being an actor, playing a different part for each trick.

54. In my first two years of high school I got into a lot of trouble with the police for minor things: graffiti, stealing, crashing cars. It was teen angst. I was uncomfortable in my own skin.




55. I was an English major at UCLA when I was 18, and then I left after a year to start acting. I was educating myself during that time.

56. But once I started doing other things - I had a book that came out, I had some art shows in New York and I started directing my own movies - then I was curious again: "OK, how are these being perceived?" It sucked me into that very addictive place where you just want to know what absolutely everyone thinks of your work...I was spending a lot of time just reading about myself.

57. Acting is an art form and you want to take roles that are challenged and it's more of a challenge I think to play dark characters. Not that I want to always play those, but it is a challenge and challenges are rewarding and fun.






58. Are we human or are we Franco?

59. There's a fear that fame is corrupting, maybe because one is more conscious of critics and how you are received and everything.

60. (on his comedic "Bar Mitzvah", as he received the Hasty Pudding 2009 Man of the Year award) Actually really touching. I'm Jewish, my mother's Jewish, but I wasn't raised Jewish. I guess I wasn't a man until tonight.

61. Funny how new facts pop up and make you doubt that there's any goodness in life. Everyone pretends to be normal and be your best friend, but underneath, everyone is living some other life you don't know about, and if only we had a camera on us at all times, we could go and watch each other's tapes and find out what each of us was really like.

62. (on directing himself as an actor) I've done it many times before - it's something I've grown used to. As a director you're viewing everything from above or the outside. You just want to make sure all the pieces are working well together. I've acted in enough films that I can feel it from the inside, like okay, this is right…I actually don't like to do it. I enjoy directing other actors more. I enjoy the collaboration between directors and actors so much that - if I can get away with not being in a movie that I'm directing - I will.

63. One of the things I've learned as a filmmaker is to have some aspect of the movie be something that I admire greatly, whether that's an actor I'm working with, the subject matter, or a book.








64. It's still hard for me. Even though people urge me to dress nicer, it's hard for me to clean up and live a clean lifestyle. I think there's something to be said for looking respectful and being presentable. It just doesn't work for me.

65. I went on maybe hundreds of auditions that I didn't get. My motto is: I work hard, whether or not it goes well. I try to stay away from a vengeance mentality. Just do my work and move on. The theater's been helpful in that. If it doesn't work out in the big professional world, I always have the theater to satisfy whatever acting needs I have.


66. (on his grandmother) She took me to Japan to meet artists there. One even invited me to live with her for a year. I didn't, and now I regret it.

67. When we were doing "Freaks and Geeks", I didn't quite understand how movies and TV worked, and I would improvise even if the camera wasn't on me. I thought I was helping the other actors by keeping them on their toes, but nobody appreciated it when I would trip them up. So I was improvising a little bit back then, but not in a productive way.

68. (on leaving university) They had ideas of how I should proceed in life. I was confused. I still felt obligated to my parents' wishes.






69. Recently I've been offered a lot of movies, but I've turned a lot down. I'm not against commercial movies, but I want something of substance.

70. Do you think I come off as not humble?

71. I think I'm just a mild-mannered guy.

72. The first piece of art that I ever bought - when I could afford it - was a Warhol sketch from the period when he was just getting out of doing commercial work and more into art. It's a sketch of a young guy's face. I guess the gallery that I bought it from thought I would like it because the young guy kind of looked like James Dean.

73. (on if he's always had confidence) Yes. It's hard enough. Rejection's hard. Fighting for something is hard when everybody else is not supportive. Especially in an artistic field where it's a lot of yourself that's being rejected, it's not just a numbers report. It's you they're saying no to.





74. Definitely bought my trap - that's what we call a house. I got my car, definitely. I had to get the rims and special glow-in-the-dark alien. You've got to look right, so I made sure I always had the clothes, that kind of thing.

75. There's a large chunk of me in all the parts. As an actor, I got involved largely because I want to let things out. The best acting is that that is most real and the only way to do that, is to genuinely feel it.


76. But I don't want to die! I have so much to do!

77. My style is casual-chic? Casual-messy?

78. I didn't really know who I was or how to express myself. It wasn't until I got to L.A. and I found the acting thing. It was like a miracle. It changed me.




79. For April Fools Day, someone played a really cruel joke on me. They stole ALL my mirrors and I had to go hours without seeing myself. I mean, I couldn't even do my daily affirmations. What kind of world is this? I tell you, it's artists like myself that really suffer.

80. I don't necessarily need to play the rebellious son, but I feel unsatisfied if I do anything light. Light doesn't really interest me.





81. The general view is that actors start on soaps and then maybe graduate to prime-time television or film; normally you don't see a film actor going to do a soap.

82. Generally I see it as a book that's supposed to touch on universal things about being a teenager and coming-of-age and learning about the bigger world…we just need a little bit more help, I'm just asking you for a little bit more help.

83. (on female fans throwing themselves at him after the release of Spider-Man) It hasn't happened, though people do recognize me more often now.

84. I worked the drive-through at McDonald's and tried out different accents - Italian, Russian, Irish.


85. I am not going to be the guy who's not pulling his weight.


86. I guess I've played a lot of brooding, troubled kinds of characters that are very inward.

87. (on Spiderman comics) I read all the old comics - the first hundred or so, I guess.

88. I was obviously the inspiration behind the character of Finnick Odair from "The Hunger Games". It's so painfully obvious.


89. (on his father) He's very supportive.

90. There's a tendency, when you're directing yourself, not to give the performance as much care, because you feel like there's too much focus on yourself, or that all these people are just standing around setting everything up, waiting for you.

91. (on his heritage) Franco is Portuguese. I'm one quarter through my grandfather. My grandfather and then I'm also Russian and Swedish.

92. Truly, I couldn't give a shit about the people who still question my sexuality. If they want to say that I'm gay, I really don't care.



93. I was just getting into acting, so I'd practice different accents on the girls. I'd be French and then Italian. One girl who liked me came around the drive-through again and said: "Could you give me some Italian lessons?"

94. I was kind of scared of failing at acting.





95. Madonna rules.

96. When I was a child, I wanted to be an actor, but I had really bad buckteeth. I didn't want to get braces, but my mom said I couldn't be an actor if I didn't get the braces. So, I got the braces.

97. Not having any real direction, one writer would lead me to another.


98. When I went to film school about three years ago, the first two years you're required to make a series of short films. I started making films based on short poems.

99. I was obsessed with lots of girls in high school.

100. Sometimes I think to myself, what should James Franco say next? And then it comes to me. Boobs.

101. (on staying in shape) Nah. I think I'm more like you. But I also don't want to take my shirt off and have the beer belly hanging out in the boxing scenes.




102. Football and basketball are kind of the tournaments of high school, and I wasn't very good at any of those.

103. I was a big partier but got bored with it. I guess I was a little freak, a little geek.


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