James Franco is an American actor, filmmaker, and college instructor. He began acting on television, guest-starring in Pacific Blue (1997). He landed his breakthrough role in the comedy-drama television series Freaks and Geeks (1999–2000). After his film debut in Never Been Kissed (1999), Franco won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Miniseries or Television Film and was nominated for Screen Actors Guild Award and Primetime Emmy Award in the same categories for playing the eponymous actor in the 2001 television biopic James Dean. He went on to play Harry Osborn in the superhero film Spider-Man (2002), and reprised the role in its sequels Spider-Man 2 (2004) and Spider-Man 3 (2007). For the last of the three, he garnered a nomination for the Saturn Award for Best Supporting Actor. His only screen appearance of 2003 was in the ballet film The Company. Franco directed and starred in the comedy The Ape (2005).

After playing one of the title roles in the romantic drama Tristan & Isolde (2006), Franco starred in the Tony Bill-directed war drama Flyboys (2006). Two years later, he played against type in the action-comedy film Pineapple Express, and earned critical acclaim for portraying Scott Smith in the biographical film Milk alongside Sean Penn. For the former, he was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Comedy. Franco portrayed the trapped canyoneer Aron Ralston in 127 Hours (2010), a survival drama, which earned him nominations for an Academy Award, BAFTA Award, Screen Actors Guild Award and Golden Globe Award, all for Best Actor. Franco appeared in four films in 2011, including the poorly-received fantasy film Your Highness, and the science fiction film Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011), a critical and commercial success.

Franco had six roles in 2012 none of which had much success except the crime-comedy film Spring Breakers, in which he played a gangster to highly positive reviews. The following year, Franco played the title role in the fantasy film Oz the Great and Powerful, and the disaster film This Is the End saw him play a fictional version of himself. For the first one, he was nominated for the Teen Choice Award for Choice Movie Actor - Fantasy. Also in 2013, he directed and starred in the drama As I Lay Dying. He starred in the action thriller Good People (2014), an adaptation of Marcus Sakey's 2008 novel of the same name. In the 2014 controversial satirical comedy The Interview, he was seen as a journalist instructed to assassinate a North Korean leader. He had nine film releases in 2015, most of which failed financially except the animated film The Little Prince, a modest commercial success. In 2017, Franco directed and starred in The Disaster Artist as Tommy Wiseau, for which he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Musical or Comedy.

Film

Key

†	Denotes works that have not yet been released

As actor

Year	Title	Role	Notes	Ref(s)
1999	Never Been Kissed	Jason Way
2000	Whatever It Takes	Chris Campbell
	If Tomorrow Comes	Devin
2001	Mean People Suck	Casey Mitchell	Short film
2002	Spider-Man	Harry Osborn
	Deuces Wild	Tino Verona
	Mother Ghost	Skateboarder Guy
	Sonny	Sonny Phillips
	City by the Sea	Joey LaMarca
2003	The Company	Josh Williams
2004	Spider-Man 2	Harry Osborn
2005	The Ape	Harry Walker
	The Great Raid	Cpt. Robert Prince
	Fool's Gold	Brent
2006	Tristan & Isolde	Prince Tristan
	Annapolis	Jake Huard
	The Wicker Man	Bar Guy #1
	Flyboys	Blaine Rawlings
	The Dead Girl	Derek
	The Holiday	Himself	Uncredited cameo
2007	An American Crime	Andy Gordon
	Interview	Voice on phone	Voice, cameo
	Finishing the Game	Rob Force
	Knocked Up	Himself	Uncredited cameo
	Spider-Man 3	Harry Osborn / New Goblin
	Good Time Max	Max
	In the Valley of Elah	Sergeant Dan Carnelli
2008	Camille	Silas Parker
	Pineapple Express	Saul Silver
	Nights in Rodanthe	Dr. Mark Flanner	Uncredited
	Milk	Scott Smith
2010	Howl	Allen Ginsberg
	Date Night	Tom "Taste" Felton
	Shadows and Lies	William Vincent
	Eat Pray Love	David Piccolo
	127 Hours	Aron Ralston
	Love & Distrust	Travis	Segment: "Grasshopper"
2011	The Green Hornet	Danny "Crystal" Clear	Uncredited cameo
	Your Highness	Prince Fabious
	The Broken Tower	Hart Crane
	Rise of the Planet of the Apes	Will Rodman
	Sal	Milton Katselas
2012	About Cherry	Francis
	Maladies	James
	The Iceman	Marty Freeman
	Spring Breakers	Alien
	The Letter	Tyrone
	The Color of Time (aka Tar)	C. K. Williams
2013	Interior. Leather Bar.	Himself
	Lovelace	Hugh Hefner
	Oz the Great and Powerful	Oscar Diggs
	As I Lay Dying	Darl Bundren
	This Is the End	Himself
	Palo Alto	Mr. B	Based on his own book
	Child of God	Jerry
	Third Person	Richard "Rick" Weiss
	Homefront	Morgan "Gator" Bodine
2014	Veronica Mars	Himself	Uncredited cameo
	Dawn of the Planet of the Apes	Will Rodman
	Good People	Tom Wright
	The Sound and the Fury	Benjy Compson
	The Interview	Dave Skylark
2015	Don Quixote: The Ingenious Gentleman of La Mancha	Pasamonte
	True Story	Christian Longo
	Yosemite	Phil
	I Am Michael	Michael Glatze
	Queen of the Desert	Henry Cadogan
	Every Thing Will Be Fine	Tomas Eldan
	Wild Horses	Ben Briggs
	The Heyday of the Insensitive Bastards	Conrad
	The Adderall Diaries	Stephen Elliott
	The Little Prince	The Fox	Voice
	Memoria	Mr. Wyckoff
	The Night Before	Himself
2016	Goat	Mitch
	Sausage Party	Druggie	Voice
	King Cobra	Joseph "Joe" Kerekes
	Burn Country	Lindsay
	The Caged Pillows	David Del Rosario	Voice, short film
	In Dubious Battle	Mac McLeod
	Why Him?	Laird Mayhew
2017	The Labyrinth	Narrator	Voice
	The Institute	Dr. Cairn
	Actors Anonymous	Jake Lamont
	The Show	Male Host
	The Disaster Artist	Tommy Wiseau
	Alien: Covenant – Prologue: Last Supper	Jacob Branson	Short film
	Alien: Covenant		Uncredited cameo
	Don't Come Back from the Moon	Roman Smalley
	The Vault	Ed Maas
	The Mad Whale	Edward Fry
2018	Future World	The Warlord
	Kin	Taylor Balik
	The Ballad of Buster Scruggs	Cowboy	Segment: "Near Algodones"
	The Pretenders	Maxwell
2019	Zeroville	Ike "Vikar" Jerome
	Arctic Dogs	Lemmy	Voice
TBA	Kill the Czar †	TBA	Post-production
	The Long Home †	Dallas Hardin	Post-production
	Alina: La Hija Rebelde †	Fidel Castro	Post-production
	The Policeman †	TBA	Post-production
	The Price of Money: A Largo Winch Adventure †	TBA	Post-production

As director

Year	Title	Credited as			Notes	Ref(s)
		Director	Writer	Producer
2005	The Ape	Yes	Yes	Executive
	Fool's Gold	Yes	Yes	No
2007	Good Time Max	Yes	Yes	No
2009	The Feast of Stephen	Yes	Yes	No	Short film
2010	Saturday Night	Yes	No	No	Documentary
2011	The Broken Tower	Yes	Yes	Yes	Also editor, created for Franco's thesis project at NYU.
	Sal	Yes	Story	No
	My Own Private River	Yes	No	No	Re-contextualized version of My Own Private Idaho Also editor and composer
2013	Interior. Leather Bar.	Yes	No	Yes	Co-directed with Travis Mathews Also cinematographer
	As I Lay Dying	Yes	Yes	No
	Child of God	Yes	Yes	No
2014	The Sound and the Fury	Yes	No	No
2016	In Dubious Battle	Yes	No	Yes
2017	The Institute	Yes	No	Executive	Co-directed with Pamela Romanowsky
	The Disaster Artist	Yes	No	Yes
2018	Future World	Yes	No	Yes	Co-directed with Bruce Thierry-Chung
	The Pretenders	Yes	No	No
2019	Zeroville	Yes	No	No
TBA	The Long Home †	Yes	No	Yes
	Bukowski †	Yes	Yes	No	Post-production

As producer

Year	Title	Notes	Ref(s)
2013	Kink	Documentary
2014	The Interview	Executive producer
2015	Yosemite
	I Am Michael
	The Adderall Diaries
2016	Goat
	King Cobra
	Why Him?	Executive producer
	L.A. Series
2017	The Labyrinth
	Actors Anonymous
	Don't Come Back from the Moon
	The Mad Whale

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes	Ref.
1997	Pacific Blue	Brian	Episode: "Matters of the Heart"
1998	To Serve and Protect	Kristin Carter	Television film
1999	Profiler	Stevie	Episode: "Three Carat Crisis"
1999–2000	Freaks and Geeks	Daniel Desario	18 episodes
2000	At Any Cost	Mike Roberts	Television film
2001	James Dean	James Dean
	The X-Files	Officer No. 2	Episode: "Surekill"
2007–2008	General Hospital: Night Shift	Franco	13 episodes
2009–2012	General Hospital		20 episodes
2008, 2009, 2014, 2017	Saturday Night Live	Himself / Host	4 episodes
2009	81st Academy Awards	Saul Silver	Television special
2010	30 Rock	Himself	Episode: "Klaus and Greta"
2011	83rd Academy Awards	Himself / Co–host	Television special
2012	FCU: Fact Checkers Unit	James	Episode: "James Franco Is Preggers"
	Hollywood Heights	Osborne "Oz" Silver	Recurring role
2013	The Mindy Project	Dr. Paul Leotard	2 episodes
	Comedy Central Roast of James Franco	Roastee	Television special
2014	Naked and Afraid	Himself	Television special
2015	Deadbeat	Johnny Penis	Episode: "The Polaroid Flasher"
2016	Angie Tribeca	Sgt. Eddie Pepper	6 episodes
	11.22.63	Jake Epping	8 episodes; also producer and directed episode: "The Truth"
	Mother, May I Sleep with Danger?	Play Director	Television film; also writer
2017	High School Lover	Rick Winters	Television film; also executive producer
2017–2019	The Deuce	Vincent Martino / Frankie Martino	25 episodes; also executive producer and directed 4 episodes

Video games

Year	Title	Role	Notes	Ref.
2007	Spider-Man 3	Harry Osborn / New Goblin

Music videos

Year	Title	Artist	Role	Ref.
2013	"City of Angels"	Thirty Seconds to Mars	Himself
2016	"Only in America"	Riff Raff	Riff Raff

Web

	Title	Role	Notes	Ref.
2014–2015	Making a Scene with James Franco	Himself / Various characters

See also

• List of awards and nominations received by James Franco