James Franco admits getting ‘D’ in acting class

[HMG Celebrity News] – Gaining success in higher education can really help you in life. But if you’re James Franco it seems to make no difference at all.

The 32-year old actor once got a ‘D’ in his acting class at NYU. But in a display of abilities usually reserved for those who get dressed in phone booths he then enrolled at UCLA to study creative writing, finished that, then moved to New York and joined Columbia’s writing program, plus an NY-U film-making course and Brooklyn College’s fiction writing program.

All while studying poetry at North Carolina’s Warren Wilson College for poetry and still making films.

But all this work has its downside — During a dull lecture last year for his MFA course at Columbia, James was snapped by a fellow student…fast asleep. So now he’s really on guard.

“I fell asleep on the train today,” he said. “And I was worried the guy next to me had his iPhone pointed in a funny way. So if you see a picture of me sleeping on the Acela, you’ll know where it came from.”

These days, James is deeply engaged in his Yale writing course;

“I have a class in Walt Whitman with a massive amount of reading to do,” he tells 411. But he’s up to the challenge, he says.

And James’ latest movie ‘Howl’ sees him immersed in the works of another famous writer, Allen Ginsberg.

In 1957 Ginsberg published a book called ‘Howl and Other Poems,’ which included references to drugs and homosexuality.
In those days anything gay was considered taboo and his publisher was charged with publishing porn. An obscenity trial promptly opened but the case was dismissed.

But the trial was a landmark in establishing First Amendment rights and is still quoted in legal matters today.

You can see Mr. Franco in action as Allen when ‘Howl’ debuts in theaters later today…