Actor James Franco has acknowledged having sex with acting school pupils, over four years after charges of sexual misconduct were made against him.
The 43-year-old settled a lawsuit for “sexually-charged behavior against female pupils” in July by agreeing to pay $2.2 million (£1.6 million).
On The Jess Cagle Podcast, he acknowledged that while he was a teacher, “he did sleep with pupils, and that was bad.”
He insisted that he did not create the institution in order to seduce ladies.
In addition to his appearances in Pineapple Express and the Spider-Man movies, Franco was nominated for best actor at the 2011 Oscars for his work in Danny Boyle’s 127 Hours.
Because “there were individuals who were furious with me and I needed to listen,” the actor said he had kept quiet about the charges involving his school for years.
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Toni Gaal and Sarah Tither-Kaplan, two former students of Franco’s Studio 4 acting school, said that he attempted to “establish a pipeline of young women who were exposed to his personal and professional sexual exploitation under the pretext of education.”
He was accused of abusing his position by holding up opportunities in his films, according to a class-action complaint that was filed in Los Angeles in 2019.
Students in this lawsuit claimed they were intimidated and sexually objectified while being tricked into paying for acting school.
Franco declared the accusations to be “untrue” when they initially arose.
However, Ms. Tither-Kaplan, Ms. Gaal, and other students who made complaints all received compensation in the end.
In snippets from the podcast that were made public, Franco claimed that he has been in sex addiction treatment since 2016 and that, since the claims against him.
On the SiriusXM show, he admitted, “I believe at the time, my attitude was if it’s consenting, OK.”
