14 DAY TRIAL // James Franco’s Comedy Central roast premiered yesterday to very good ratings, even if it didn’t top Charlie Sheen’s record-breaking 2011 roast. Speaking with the Daily Beast about one of the most popular jokes on the show, centered on his alleged gay orientation, Franco says he isn’t bothered one bit.
Rumors about Franco’s orientation have been around since forever, but he never directly addressed them in terms of offering a denial or a confirmation.
At times, he even tried to keep them going because, he said, they helped him maintain a certain aura of mystery around his public image, which, in turn, helped him take on a wide range of characters and make them all equally believable.
This is why he wasn’t upset by all the gay jokes made about him at the roast.
“There’s two sides to what happened in the roast. If that’s what they were going to make fun of me for, I was like, ‘Great! Bring on the gay jokes!’ because these aren’t insults at all,” he says.
“I don’t even care if people think I’m gay, so it was like, ‘Awesome!’ I mean, I wish I was… I wish I was gay,” he continues.
Pressed to explain that last part of his statement, Franco says there’s no need to “go into it.”
But, he adds, “part of it is that movies are a place where people can project things and identify with characters, and it’s the same thing with actors outside of their roles – and it’s been that way since Hollywood was around. That’s why there’s a lot of conjecture.”
“That’s been one of my things, too. My relationship with my public image over the past four or five years has just become weirder and weirder, because I look at it and it’s me, and it’s not me, so if other people want to use that for their own purposes or needs, I’m fine with it,” he adds.
In the same interview, Franco admits that he did find some jokes pretty offensive but, luckily for viewers, they were cut in the final edit: about 40 minutes of them, he says.