In True Story and I Am Michael, which are both premiering at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, the 36-year-old actor struggles to perform within his own enigmatic persona.
James Franco and Zachary Quinto in I Am Michael
Cara Howe
Jonah Hill and James Franco in True Story
Mary Cybulski
PARK CITY, UTAH — James Franco has built his career, at least in part, on making audiences wonder what he is really thinking. Why is he really starring on a daytime soap opera? Why would he really host the Oscars? Why does he really keep winking about his own sexuality? Even his trademark Cheshire smile suggests some kind of hidden knowledge, as if he's sitting on a secret too exquisite to reveal.
And that made Franco's confession at the post-premiere Q&A of True Story, one of two films starring the actor that is debuting at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival, all the more shocking. Franco was asked by a Sundance programmer about what drew him to the role of Christian Longo, a man who was accused of murdering his three young children and wife and then fled to Mexico under the assumed identity of disgraced former New York Times reporter Michael Finkel (Jonah Hill).
"I was always interested in this character. I don't know why," Franco said. Then, he paused for a brief moment, before uncharacteristically blurting out his next thought, "I hate this character."
It's a startling statement for any actor to make, but from Franco, an actor not known for bluntly honest revelations, it was a particularly unexpected one. In the same breath, he even acknowledged that this is something actors aren't supposed to do. "As an actor, you always want to not be judging your characters as you play them," he said. And yet, Franco went on to admit that he found it so difficult to find anything about Longo he could identify with that at one point, he couldn't even concentrate while performing a scene. "Wow," Franco remembered thinking. "I'm distracted because I hate him so much."
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