James Franco Discusses Soap Role, Deitch Show

No, there can never be too much James Franco news. The actor has been making the rounds screening Howl, where a lucky NY Mag writer caught up with him. Instead of asking about his portrayal of Alan Ginsberg, however, Franco was asked about his role on General Hospital. And thank goodness for that, because frankly we couldn't get through the first paragraph of the explanation he penned for the Wall Street Journal.

The actor recalls the idea came about when he was prepping for a new movie with the artist Carter (here's a taste of his work), called Maladies, where he plays a former soap star. He says, “Now, just because I’m playing a character who was formerly on a soap opera doesn’t mean I had to go on a soap opera, right? So going on General Hospital isn’t directly related to Maladies. But we got to talking, like, ‘Hey, what if I really did a soap opera? That would be kind of amazing!’” So he called the powers that be up and said: "I want to play an artist, and I want him to be crazy." The soap scribes took it from there.

And here's an interesting bit, Franco brought his own crew on set and filmed the filming! The footage will be part of an upcoming performance-art show at Deitch Projects in Long Island City, which is still yet to be confirmed. If it does go down, expect it sometime this spring... and General Hospital may even film parts of it for a special episode.