The Artist’s “public persona”
James Franco covers the new comedy issue of GQ because he stars in the upcoming This Is The End. Why are only Apatow people considered for comedy prime coverage? So now he’s a comedian too, in addition to being an actor, director, painter, poet, and academic...
Have I missed anything?
Maybe illusionist? Master manipulator? No, no, no. It turns out, when you’re rolling your eyes at James Franco, it’s only because you only partially understand him. As he tells GQ:
"My public persona is something that is only partially constructed by me, so if people want to mock that, it's fine. I mock it."
Wait. So if it’s constructed, does that mean it’s his joke to mock? And if you’re laughing, does it means it’s working? Has the Artist been playing us all along?
God it’s so f-cking meta, who has the energy?
But at least he’s honest, right? Well, at least he is about Your Highness:
"Your Highness? That movie sucks. You can't get around that."
Sure we can. Your Highness was both Franco and Natalie Portman. How did that happen?! And if you press him on it, would he say it’s because he didn’t write and direct? He wrote the screenplay for and directed and stars in the upcoming Faulkner adaptation of As I Lay Dying which will screen in Cannes. A trailer was just released. Hard to say from this preview whether or not he’s been able to capture the multi-narrator perspective of the source material. Still, no one ever snarks on Franco about his talent as an actor or, for that matter, his talents related to film production in general. It’s when he starts ode-ing the President and asserting himself as a “public intellectual” and arting up Kristen Stewart’s ass that it becomes tiresome.
Click here to see more of Franco in GQ. Is that skeleton giving him a blow?