Seth Rogen says he does not plan to work with regular co-star James Franco any time soon following allegations Franco intimidated students at an acting and film school he founded into gratuitous and exploitative sexual situations in 2018.
Rogen made the revelation in an interview with the U.K.'s Sunday Times during which he discussed how his friendship with Franco has changed since allegations of sexual misconduct were brought forth against the actor.
"What I can say is that I despise abuse and harassment and I would never cover or conceal the actions of someone doing it, or knowingly put someone in a situation where they were around someone like that," Rogen said when asked if he believed the allegations against Franco might be true.
A settlement agreement was reached in February in a lawsuit that alleged Franco pushed his students into performing in increasingly explicit sex scenes on camera in an “orgy type setting” that went far beyond those acceptable on Hollywood film sets and that Franco “sought to create a pipeline of young women who were subjected to his personal and professional sexual exploitation in the name of education.”
Rogen originally said he would continue to work with Franco despite the allegations, but has since done an about-face.
"I also look back to that interview in 2018 where I comment that I would keep working with James, and the truth is that I have not and I do not plan to right now," Rogen said.
Franco has repeatedly denied the allegations and his lawyers dismissed the claims as "false and inflammatory, legally baseless and brought as a class action with the obvious goal of grabbing as much publicity as possible for attention-hungry Plaintiffs," according to Yahoo! Entertainment.
He also insisted that the claims made against him were "not accurate" during an appearance on Stephen Colbert’s "The Late Show."
Nevertheless, Rogen said his professional relationship, which seems to have ended, was "not a coincidence," adding that their friendship has also been strained.
"I don’t know if I can define that right now during this interview," Rogen said of their friendship. "I can say it, um, you know, it has changed many things in our relationship and our dynamic."
He added that, although it was painful, it was "not as painful and difficult as it is for a lot of other people involved."
The interview comes just over a month after actress Charlyne Yi stated in an Instagram post that she had tried to quit filming, "The Disaster Artist," which Franco directed and starred in, after the allegations emerged. She claimed to have been bribed to stay and revealed that Rogen knew about it.
"Seth Rogen was one of the producers on this film so he definitely knows about the bribe and why I quit," she wrote in her post, which included a statement elaborating on the ordeal.
"When I tried to break legal contract & quit Disaster Artist because James Franco is a sexual predator, they tried to bribe me with a bigger acting role," she wrote. "I cried and told them that that was the exact opposite to what I wanted, that I didn't feel safe working with a f***ing sexual predator. They minimized & said Franco being a predator was so last yr and that he changed … when I literally heard of him abusing new women that week."
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Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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