General Hospital Alum James Franco Spotted in Public After Avoiding Hollywood

The versatile actor who played serial killer Franco on General Hospital, had fallen from grace after several allegations of impropriety. Now, he’s been spotted back out in the public and is ready to move forward with his life.

He Wanted to Be a Soap Actor

Although Roger Howarth did a great job playing the GH character Franco, who reformed his serial killer ways due to a brain tumor, no one could come close to Franco’s original portrayer who oozed giddy, diabolical evil in every scene. We’re talking, of course, about movie star James Franco, who played the character from 2009 to 2012. In July 2010, he told The New Yorker that he and an artist named Carter were planning on making a film in which he played a soap actor, and he stated, “What if I really did that? Wouldn’t that be interesting?” 

Having the same manager as Steve Burton, who plays mafia enforcer Jason Morgan, he had the rep contact the soap to see if he could appear on it. “They were very happy,” he said, adding, “They said, ‘You can do anything — what kind of part would you like to play?’ I wanted their full treatment, so all I said was that I wanted to be an artist and I wanted my character to be crazy.” 

Named Franco, after his portrayer, the character was a performance art killer who played cat-and-mouse games with Jason, also a killer — albeit a good guy — hoping that the hitman would be enamored by his villainous stunts. The story got a little convoluted when he left that part and Howarth took over, but is still fondly remembered to this day.

He Dropped Out of the Limelight for Five Years

Franco was running a film school called Studio 4, and in 2018 several women and students alleged that he engaged in sexual misconduct. In 2019, two more students created a lawsuit that claimed his school was exploitative and nothing more than a way to bilk people out of money.

According to The Sun, his lawyer, Michael Plonsker, stated “James will not only fully defend himself, but will also seek damages from the plaintiffs and their attorneys for filing this scurrilous publicity-seeking lawsuit.” Things got so bad that even actor Seth Rogen, who collaborated with Franco on several projects, distanced himself from the star. Ultimately, at the conclusion of the case, $2,235,000 was paid to the alleged victims, and Franco admitted to having relations with some of his female students in the past.

Having been disgraced, the actor stepped away from the public eye in 2019 but now has new projects in the works. The Sun reported that he and his girlfriend Isabel Pakzad, who stood by him during his legal issues, were seen meeting friends earlier this month at 2:30 am on a street in Paris.

They had attended the Cannes Film Festival, and the outlet shared photographs of the two, with Franco wearing a Cannes hat and looking like he’d gained a significant amount of weight. The paper also reported that he had a hard time keeping up with his friends. The early morning moment was one of the first times he’s been seen in public since 2019, the first being at the Milan Fashion Week in January.