James Franco is one of the most magnetic and ambitious young actors of his generation. He has the chops to play James Dean, Hugh Hefner, Alan Ginsberg and the trapped-between-a-rock-and-a-hard-place thrill seeker Aron Ralston in 127 Hours. He is also compulsively busy, with acting (he has 13 films completed, in production or in the works, according to his IMDb page), as well as writing and directing. He made three films last year, is working on three more and recently signed on to adapt the hilarious bestseller The Disaster Artist, about the making of the cult phenomenon The Room. It would not be big news if Franco pulls a Prestige-like twist and reveals that he’s had a twin helping him complete his mountains of acting and filmmaking work.
Franco may suffer from terminal exhaustion by the time he is 40, but at least he is choosing interesting roles. He gave one of 2013’s most memorable performances as the garish, hip hop Gatsby persona Alien in Harmony Korine’s Spring Breakers. Although the film got a wildly mixed reception, Franco’s performance was too sublimely absurd to ignore. The actor even received awards recognition for his wild turn. So, it is not much of a surprise that he may hop onto A Crack Up at the Race Riots, based on Korine’s 1998 book.
The Pineapple Express actor is reportedly looking to play the leader of a Ku Klux Klan-like cult in the film. This was revealed in a New York Post interview with Sidney and Thurman Sewell, known as the ATL Twins, who played part of Alien’s posse in Spring Breakers. “[Franco’s] going to be like a KKK leader and we’re gonna be his goons,” the rappers told the New York Post. “It’s really strange, in a good way.”
Meanwhile, anybody interested in checking out A Crack Up at the Race Riots in book form is in for, well, quite a ride, even by Harmony Korine’s standards. The novel, which was re-released last year, chronicles a race war in Florida, with the whites run by Vanilla Ice and the black citizens run by MC Hammer. The absurdist novel is a jumbled bunch of episodes and is filled with short stories, free verse, found letters and some rather provocative stabs at race and gender. If this sounds like a good read, please enjoy. Otherwise, I highly recommend Greg Sestero’s tell-all The Disaster Artist.
Another Korine-Franco collaboration will probably be filled with crazy surprises, to say the least. Although the director is not yet attached to this adaptation, he seems like the natural choice to bring his audacious vision to the big screen. Meanwhile, Franco will be seen next in The Interview, True Story, Good People and a half-dozen other projects over the coming year.