I would really hate to have James Franco as an ex-boyfriend – and not just because of all the explaining I'd have to do. The man is everywhere and increasingly so. It used to be that if you wanted to see James Franco you had to rent Spiderman or dig up old episodes of Freaks and Geeks. Or maybe you could Google him and see what popped up, (hopefully WWJFD). For better or worse, (mostly worse), he wasn't part of our daily lives. It's hard to imagine that was ever the case with how often we're confronted with his face now.
Months and months ago, the blog WWJFD (What Would James Franco Do), started as a joke between my (now former) co-worker and I. After writing a rather interesting piece on whether or not James Franco is crazy, (conclusion still TBD), she prodded me to add a piece to the website. I put it off. Because that's what I do. I took off traveling around the U.S. before moving 6000 miles away from San Francisco to a little place we like to call New Zealand. I figured that being so far from James Franco and the American media, “The Frank” would fall out of my life.
I was wrong.
It all started innocently enough. I made friends with another girl living in my hostel. After we each moved into our respective flats we kept hanging out and started going to movies together. One evening she invited a group of people out to see Eat, Pray, Love. Now, you have to understand that I could have sworn I had missed out on seeing this film in the theater. It was practically out of DVD in the U.S. but had just hit South Pacific shores... apparently. I had put it off not because of James Franco, (that wouldn't have made any sense, no, none at all), but I suspect because I find Elizabeth Gilbert a little annoying. (Nothing personal, Liz. I'm sure it sucks to be a travel writer who can't stop falling in love. Or something.) Long story short, I watched it, loved it, and now I want to go to Bali.
But then again, you expect to see James Franco appear in a movie every once in awhile. He's an actor and they are prone to that. Seeing him in Eat, Pray, Love wasn't a surprise, (after all, I had been exposed to the previews for the film for months due to my change of locations). However, he would start to appear more and more in my world over the coming months. Each time, I'd be reminded that WWJFD needed an article. Each time, I'd think, “Maybe I should write that”.
Do you know how many times I've seen the preview for 127 Hours? Every single time I've gone out to the movies in the past five weeks. And that's a lot. Because I live in New Zealand and there isn't that much to do here. (Sure you can go hiking, but as I've learned from every preview I've seen of 127 Hours, there are potential dangers in that. But I digress...) Where I live, they tend to only show a couple of previews for upcoming movies along with an advert for something random like a bank or digital television before the feature presentation starts. That turns into a lot of accidental Franco ingestion over the long-term.
A friend from the States visited me over my Christmas holiday and we went off into some rather remote areas of New Zealand in search of sun, surf, and sand. We ended up in a small beach town where I grabbed the newspaper while walking to my room one day. I opened in up to find a two page spread on James Franco. In really small font. That's a lot of Franco for the middle of nowhere.
All of the above is in addition to comments I've overheard about Franco hosting the Oscars, Franco on General Hospital, Franco opening random art exhibitions, Franco dressing as a woman, Franco landing in a homemade spacecraft on the moon... It's an all Franco, all the time kind of world.
What was my most recent reminder of The Frank though? What finally made me write my article for WWJFD? I was wondering around my own living room about a week ago when my Irish flatmate walked in. She asked what I was up to anything in particular. When I (perhaps un-wisely) responded, “No”, she replied with the following, “Well, if you want, I have a copy of 127 Hours on my laptop that you can watch. While you were in the toilet the other day, your friend told me how into James Franco you are!” And so there it is, we're not even safe in our own homes as long as our flatmates have access to digital media.
Then and there I decided that WWJFD needed a little updating. Because, apparently, the man isn't going anywhere anytime soon. And thank God for that.
-Stacy Beckley, WWJFD Correspondent reporting from New Zealand
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