James Franco faced allegations of sexual misconduct from five different women back in 2018, and since then, the actor hasn’t been too busy in Hollywood. At the time of the accusations, longtime friend and collaborator Seth Rogen said that he would still keep working with his Pineapple Express and The Interview co-star in the future. However, according to a new interview with the Superbad star, his attitude on that front has changed, and now he has no plans to work with James Franco again.
Seth Rogen was recently interviewed for The Sunday Times in the United Kingdom. During their chat, he was asked about the accusations made by Knocked Up co-star Charlene Yi on Instagram back in April, with regards to enabling James Franco’s sexual misconduct.
In the post, Yi explained that she didn’t want to keep a role she signed on for in The Disaster Artist once the allegations against Franco came to light. Yi said, “I didn’t feel safe working with a fucking sexual predator,” especially since she heard about Franco abusing other women during the week these allegations surfaced. In response, apparently Yi was offered a bigger role in the movie, but she still wanted no part in the production. She was especially uneasy thinking about a joke from Saturday Night Live back in 2014, which made light of a publicized situation where Franco had been accused of engaging with underage girls on Instagram.
Rogen didn’t directly address having any knowledge of the situation with Charlene Yi on The Disaster Artist, a film on which he was a producer. But when asked whether he believes Yi’s accusations, Rogen said:
“What I can say is that I despise abuse and harassment, and I would never cover or conceal the actions of someone doing it, or knowingly put someone in a situation where they were around someone like that. However, I do look back at a joke I made on Saturday Night Live in 2014 and I very much regret making that joke. It was a terrible joke, honestly.”
So where does that leave Rogen and Franco? Rogen stops short of saying that he’s no longer friends with Franco, saying, “I don’t know if I can define that right now during this interview. I can say it, um, you know, it has changed many things in our relationship and our dynamic.” That includes having any plans to work with Franco. Rogen addressed his previous comments about his willingness to work with Franco again, even after the accusations surfaced in 2018:
“I … look back to that interview in 2018, where I comment that I would keep working with James, and the truth is that I have not, and I do not plan to right now.”
Seth Rogen and James Franco have been friends since their breakthrough roles on the short-lived but beloved series Freaks and Geeks in 1999. They became a potent comedic duo at the box office too. So it has to be challenging for Rogen knowing that someone that he considered a close friend did something so heinous. He acknowledges that it’s been a painful experience, but he also said it’s “not as painful and difficult as it is for a lot of other people involved.”
With so many accusations lobbied against James Franco, it doesn’t seem like there’s any hope for him to make a comeback, especially in the era of the #MeToo movement. It would take a lot of effort for Franco to be able to redeem himself and repent for what he’s done. If that ever happens, maybe Rogen would reconsider his stance, but for now, we’re glad that he’s on the side of the victims and has seen the error of his ways. That’s much more important than ever seeing Pineapple Express 2.
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