James Franco

Airbnb's Pop-Up Rooms Inspired by Celebrities Were Not Exactly a 'Love Letter' to L.A.

Airbnb is the online connection between travelers looking to save a buck and home owners hocking their houses as lodging. This past weekend, they launched a Hollywood-style welcome campaign in all the obvious parts of the city including the Sunset Strip (at the Viper room), Venice (at HGEL homegrown ... More >>

10 Hottest Professors Teaching in L.A.

It's been said that Los Angeles has its share, perhaps more than its share, of attractive people. And so it stands to reason that some of them might be teaching in our 67 or so colleges and universities, assigning us homework, grading our papers, asking to see us during their office hours, and so fo ... More >>

Telluride Film Festival 2013: A Wrap-Up

Venice Update: Kelly Reichardt's Night Moves, James Franco's Child of God, and More

James Franco's Comedy Central Roast: The Highlights

Last night, James Franco was the guest of dishonor at the Comedy Central Roast of James Franco (airing Labor Day) at Culver Studios in Culver City. The network normally roasts celebs who've become pop culture punch lines, like Charlie Sheen, Joan Rivers, Donald Trump and David Hasselhoff. Sure, Fran ... More >>

What if Jeffrey Deitch and MOCA Had Made it Work?

The official announcement that the Museum of Contemporary Art's director Jeffrey Deitch would step down only arrived at 3:30 p.m. yesterday, nearly two days after L.A. Weekly's Dennis Romero reported the resignation's imminence and one day after editorials on Deitch's tenure began appearing on arts ... More >>

Lots of Movies This Week Blur the Line Between Fiction and Reality

Judging from current releases, the hallmark of screen success isn't landing a starring role in Man of Steel; it's getting a movie filmed in your house. Shot in 12 days at the filmmaker's Malibu home, Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing took in a healthy per-screen gross over the weekend. Likewise s ... More >>

This Is the End Review: The World Collapses Not With a Whimper But With a Dick Joke

Five Amazing, Ridiculous Soap Opera Plots

MOCA to Merge With Pinterest

Beset by financial troubles and a series of staff departures, the Museum of Contemporary Art has announced a surprise move: It will merge with the social networking site Pinterest. Effective today, MOCA is closing its brick and mortar locations, including its Grand Avenue headquarters, Geffen Conte ... More >>

Professor James Franco: A UCLA Student Talks About What It Was Like to Take the Actor's Screenplay Class

See also: *More L.A. Weekly Film Coverage James Franco: actor, director, screenwriter, poet, painter and now professor. Last quarter, the man with many talents decided to take his gifts and share them with the students of UCLA. Franco is still teaching at UCLA for the winter quarter and then will ... More >>

Spring Breakers Review: Godard Meets Girls Gone Wild

Spring Breakers Director Harmony Korine Explains the Darkness Behind Partying in Bikinis

See also: Spring Breakers Review: Godard Meets Girls Gone Wild

Oz the Great and Powerful Is Neither of Those Things

10 Most Memorable L.A. Art Events of 2012

This year felt like a year of growing pains for art in Los Angeles. Maybe that's because 2012 started as Pacific Standard Time -- that regionwide, Getty-funded series of exhibitions on SoCal art history -- wound down and the art community shifted attention from past to present. Maybe it's because th ... More >>

L.A. horror story

Five Artsy Things to Do This Week, Including a Terrorist in the Museum

This week, an artist deconstructs the pom-pom, two holes get cut in gallery walls and an exhibition suggests the wrong man took the blame for murder 83 years ago. 5. Wallflower whirlpool Jen Stark cut a hole the shape of a water lily into the northernmost wall of Martha Otero gallery, then built u ... More >>

James Franco Vanessa Hudgens Ashley Benson vs. Asia Argento Charlotte Gainsbourg François Cluzet : Threesomes at the Toronto Film Festival

This is a blog post about two movies that were screened for the press within the first 24 hours of the Toronto Film Festival, both of which feature three-way sex scenes. In Spring Breakers, characters played by James Franco, Vanessa Hudgens and Ashley Benson "do it" in a swimming pool; in Do Not Dis ... More >>

The Secret Meeting Between Skrillex, James Franco, Harmony Korine and Gucci Mane

Provocateur Harmony Korine has again reached deep inside his bag of WTF for his latest feature, Spring Breakers. Set for release in 2013, the movie's casting has generated quite a buzz already: It features Disney star Selena Gomez being bad, James Franco in cornrows, and Georgia rapper Gucci Mane sh ... More >>

James Franco's Art: A Layperson's Guide

See also: *James Franco's MOCA Show Opening: 'There's Just a Lot of Dicks in There' *James Franco & Alex Israel: Why Their Obsession With Celebrity Doesn't Pay Off Who are we to argue celebrity artistic merit -- or any artistic merit anywhere? It is 2012, after all, and it has kinda all been done. ... More >>

James Franco, Paul McCarthy & Damon McCarthy

Five Artsy Things to Do This Week, Including Sculptures of Fax Machines

This week, snarky performance artist Eleanor Antin remembers Stalin, Paul McCarthy pulls a chair out from under a fictional Natalie Wood and sculptor Emily Counts turns a fax machine mystical. 5. What's war got to do with it? In the trailer for their new exhibition and performance series, Arjun Ne ... More >>

James Franco and Alex Israel: Why Their Obsession With Celebrity Doesn't Pay Off

In the span of a week, MOCA has subjected us to not one but two art installations that are heavily dependent on celebrity for their content. James Franco's "Rebel" opened the weekend before last at the JF Chen showroom, and this past Saturday night Alex Israel had a video screening and performance o ... More >>

James Franco's MOCA Show Opening Night: 'There's Just a Lot of Dicks in There'

"There's just a lot of dicks in there. A lot of porno," the painter Ty Williams says, shaking his head. "But I get it, though. I understand the prevalence of penises." We're standing in the alleyway behind JF Chen, a collectible furniture showroom and exhibit space, at the opening party for "Rebel ... More >>

Five Comedy Web Series You Need to Watch Now

Last weekend, the third L.A. Web Series Festival (a.k.a. LA Web Fest) took over the LAX Radisson Hotel, bringing a wide variety of Internet-based programming to screening rooms. I stopped by the event on Saturday afternoon and got to check out episodes from over 20 series. The annual convention ce ... More >>

MOCA to Import 'Heavier Rock' From 'Much Farther Away'

In a move emblematic of the fierce competition for museumgoers, MOCA will follow the recent phenomenon of the LACMA Rock by importing a "heavier rock" transported from "much farther away," the museum announced in a statement. For MOCA's installation, dubbed Elevated Math, artist Layne Christensen w ... More >>

Marijuana-Like Compound in Your Brain Could be Magic Pill For Weight Loss: But Don't Reach For The Doritos Just Yet

Oh boy. You stoners are going to love this one. Turns out the key to weight loss might be a marijuana-like chemical that already exists in your brain. While there are skinny weed advocates out there like Seth Rogen (after) and James Franco, consider all the Taco Bell you ate in the name of bud or t ... More >>

James Franco Clowns USC 'Undergrads' With New Reality Show: VIDEO

It looks like reality show footage produced by actor James Franco during his time on the USC campus in 2010 is coming to fruition. The renaissance man who has written a book, taught poetry as a post-graduate and starred in major Hollywood roles -- none of which he's apparently done very well -- tak ... More >>

The Three Best Karaoke Bars in L.A.

Tiffany Rose We can't promise James Franco doing karaoke in drag, but you never know​Did you catch our Best Of issue and snag our free Best Of app? Even if you did, we're betting you didn't make it through all of our write-ups; there are about a billion. So in the coming weeks we'll walk you t ... More >>

James Franco to Direct a Documentary About L.A.'s Favorite Industry: Porn

Franco file.​After writing books, teaching at NYU, taking classes at Columbia, hosting Saturday Night Live and, oh yeah, acting in movies, James Franco might have found his true calling: Making a documentary about smut. Because those who can't do teach (or make documentaries), apparently. He ... More >>

Rise of the Planet of the Apes: Simian Disobedience

The making of a monkey activist

Perform Chinatown Festival: Vikings, Bunnies, Unicorns, Masturbation, an Emperor With (Literally) No Clothes and More

Catherine WagleyJohn Kilduff (a.k.a. Mr Let's Paint) painting a character actor who appeared as "The Emperor with No Clothes"​ Vikings, oversized bunnies, an itinerant matchmaker, a painting instructor doubling as a life coach and running on a treadmill, an impromptu dinner party, a woman mast ... More >>

There's No Center Like PEN Center

High Holidays: 10 Celebrities Likely to Be Celebrating Both 420 and Passover This Year

​Two very special holidays for the peoples of Los Angeles happen to fall on the same Hump Day this year: 4/20 and Passover, Day 2. One is a silly excuse to dabble in unmentionables (which a certain High Times editor claims "points us in a direction for the responsible use of cannabis") and the ... More >>

Your Highness

Stars of Freaks & Geeks and Undeclared Converge at Paley Fest Reunion

Many beloved television series get asked back to the Paley Festival during their runs. Then there are those short-run shows whose brief lives on air have been surpassed by their staying power with audiences so that a retrospective draws passionate fans back for more. Such is the love for Judd Apatow ... More >>

LA Phil's #Ask Gustavo: Celebrity Edition!

Anika Noni Rose will play a more innocent vixen this weekend​The city of Los Angeles loves the wild-haired wizard of Walt Disney Concert Hall, conductor Gustavo Dudamel. The LA Phil knows the gold mine they got with their music director--he made even us classical-music commoners stop yawning a ... More >>

Nikki Finke, Elusive Hollywood Blogger, Makes Stink About Oscars 'Nightmare,' or the 'Worst Snorecast Ever'

Pwned.​Updated after the jump: Audio of Nikki Finke calling for the resignation of Academy President Tom Sherak! Worlds more entertaining than the Academy Awards themselves this year were the fang-tastic bloggings of celeb scooper Nikki Finke -- a celebrity in her own right, though she's take ... More >>

Your Gold Standard 2011 PSA: Yes, There Are Still Tickets Available

​ Put down that hamburger or plate of duck carnitas taco right now. Because if you're not fasting already, or existing on a movie star diet of consommé and salads, you maybe need to be. No, not because you can't move after last night's Oscar bash (your James Franco and pot brownies joke here ... More >>

Oscars 2011: The Most Embarrasing Academy Awards Ever?

"It's the young and hip Oscars!" So chirped Anne Hathaway when returning to the mic after 50 year-old winner Melissa Leo--looking much more legitimately glamorous than in those for your consideration ads she controversially self-financed--spontaneously let the word "fucking" escape her lips whil ... More >>

James Franco Will Be Singing at His "Secret" L.A. Bar--But Where Is It? [UPDATE: We Found It and Tell You Where It Is!]

James Franco: Secret L.A. Bar Owner, Singer (and Hunk, Graduate Student, etc.)​ [UPDATE: We found it, thanks to a tweet by @Vxronica: exact location of James Franco's "secret" bar and his Oscar afterparty, below.] The Hollywood Reporter found an intriguing item during a James Franco interview ... More >>

Sundance Film Festival: Duh, Hot Girls Make Difficult Films More Marketable

An alternate universe with an uncertain future

We Cast the "L.A. Music Scene 2011" Biopic!: Which Top 10 Relevant Actors and Actresses Should Play These 10 Relevant L.A. Musicians?

10 Actors to Play Musicians in L.A.'s Music Scene

James Franco, Anne Hathaway To Host Oscars?

Movie WebAnne Hathaway and James Franco are rumored to be cast together in a future "Alien" prequel​Access Hollywood and USA Today -- followed by everyone else, now, in a game of scrambly Hollywood telephone -- are reporting that dashing youngsters James Franco and Anne Hathaway have been chos ... More >>

Nightranger: WILD FRONTIER

127 HOURS

THEY SAY GOOBER AND GOMER WERE JUST COUSINS

Bad Trips: Pineapple Express, Transsiberian

Not McLovin'

Film Reviews

Including this week's picks, Jackass Number Two and The Science of Sleep

James at 24

Forever