James Edward Franco is an American actor, director, screenwriter, film producer, and artist. He began acting during the late 1990s, appearing on the series Freaks and Geeks and starring in several teen films. He won a Golden Globe Award for playing the title role in the made-for-television film James Dean, and has become known among audiences for his role as Harry Osborn in the Spider-Man films. In 2006, Franco had a starring role in three Hollywood films, Tristan & Isolde, Annapolis and Flyboys.
Franco was born in Palo Alto, California, the son of Betsy (née Verne), a poet, author and editor, and Doug Franco. Franco grew up in California with his two younger brothers, Tom and Dave, and graduated from Palo Alto High School in 1996. He then enrolled at the University of California, Los Angeles as an English major, and studied acting. Much to the disapproval of his parents, he dropped out after his freshman year and chose to pursue a professional career as an actor, taking acting lessons with Robert Carnegie at Playhouse West.
In 1999 he got his first break after he was cast in a leading role on the short-lived but well-reviewed television series Freaks and Geeks. Franco's first major film was the romantic comedy Whatever It Takes (2000), where he met his co-star, now ex-girlfriend Marla Sokoloff. He was subsequently cast as James Dean in director Mark Rydell's 2001 biographical TV film of the same name. The role brought Franco much critical acclaim, and he was distinguished in 2002 with a Golden Globe Award, as well as nominated for an Emmy Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award. Both Spider-Man (2002) and Spider-Man 2 (2004) iw hich Franco played were very well-received critically and commercially. Franco has also co-starred with Neve Campbell in Robert Altman's The Company (2003).
In 2006, Franco co-starred with Tyrese Gibson in Annapolis and played legendary hero Tristan in Tristan & Isolde, a dramatization of the Tristan and Iseult story also starring English actress Sophia Myles. He then trained with the stunt team "The Blue Angels" and received a pilot's license in preparation for his role in Flyboys,which was released in September of 2006; the same month, Franco appeared briefly in The Wicker Man, a horror film starring Nicolas Cage (who directed him in Sonny).
Franco's next role was in Spider-Man 3, released on May 1 2007. He is scheduled to star in several other films due for a 2008 release, including Pineapple Express, a comedy co-starring Seth Rogen and written and produced by Judd Apatow, both of whom worked with Franco on Freaks and Geeks. Franco made cameo appearances in The Holiday and Knocked Up. He was also featured in the mockumentary, "Finding Ben Stone", on the two-disc edition of Knocked Up, where he gets fired from the lead role.
Franco has been signed to star opposite Sean Penn, Josh Brolin, and Emile Hirsch in Gus Van Sant's upcoming Harvey Milk bio-pic Milk. Franco is playing Milk's lover and manager Scott Smith. Penn plays Harvey Milk while Brolin plays Milk's assassin, Dan White, and Hirsch plays Cleve Jones.
