James Franco

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James Edward Franco (born April 19, 1978) is an American actor.

1 Early life
2 Film career
3 Selected Filmography
4 External links

Early life

Franco was born in Palo Alto, California to Doug Franco and Besty Levine Verne (a Jewish poet, author and editor); his maternal grandmother runs the Verne Art Gallery, a prominent art gallery in Cleveland. He graduated from Palo Alto High School in 1996 and enrolled at the University of California, Los Angeles as an English major, but dropped out after his freshman year to pursue acting. After studying with Robert Carnegie at Playhouse West, Franco got his first break in 1999, after he was cast in a leading role on the short-lived but well-reviewed TV series Freaks and Geeks.

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Film career

Franco appeared in a few commercially unsuccessful films, including Whatever It Takes (2000) and Deuces Wild (2002). His reputation grew in 2001, after playing James Dean in the made-for-television movie titled James Dean; he won both the Golden Globe Award and the Screen Actors' Guild Award for his performance.

Franco was originally considered for the lead role of Peter Parker in the film version of Spider-Man, but was instead cast in the supporting role of Harry Osborn, the son of the villainous Green Goblin. Both Spider-Man (2002) and Spider-Man 2 (2004) were very well-received critically and commercially, and Franco has since co-starred with Neve Campbell in The Company (2003) and Tyrese Gibson in Annapolis (2006). He has also signed to return in Spider-Man 3, currently scheduled for release in 2007.

Franco has dated actress Marla Sokoloff.

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Selected Filmography

Year	Title	Role	Other notes
2007	Spider-Man 3	Harry Osborn	pre-production
2006	Annapolis	Jake Huard
2006	Tristan and Isolde	Tristan
2005	The Great Raid	Captain Prince
2004	Spider-Man 2	Harry Osborn
2003	The Company	Josh
2002	City By The Sea	Joey
2002	Spider-Man	Harry Osborn
2002	Deuces Wild	Tino
2000	Whatever It Takes	Chris Campbell