James Franco has officially settled the sexual misconduct lawsuit that was made against him in 2019, with the claims against him being dropped after both parties reportedly reached an agreement.
Allegations against Franco first surfaced in 2017, when multiple women who were students at Franco’s now non-existent LA film school, Studio 4, claimed he engaged in sexual misconduct while teaching ‘sex scene masterclasses’.
According to allegations made by these students, Franco “would always make everybody think there were possible roles on the table if we were to perform sexual acts or take off our shirts.”
The allegations, first published in the Los Angeles Times, also claimed that Franco would remove vaginal guards from women while simulating oral sex scenes in class.
Two of these women, Sarah Tither-Kaplan and Toni Gaal, made an official lawsuit against Franco in 2019. They claimed that they were sexually exploited by Franco while attending the school back in 2014.
Their lawsuit alleged that James Franco’s masterclass “was little more than a scheme to provide him and his male collaborators with a pool of young female performers that they could take advantage of.”
According to them, Franco was merely using the sexually-themed class to “create a pipeline of young women who were subjected to his personal and professional sexual exploitation in the name of education.”
According to The Hollywood Reporter, both sides submitted a joint status report to the judge, saying that an agreement had been reached between both parties.
At the moment, the claims against Franco have been officially dropped, however, there is no more information at this time about the nature of the agreement.
James Franco denied the allegations when asked about them on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, saying:
“The things that I heard that were… not accurate, but I completely support people coming out and being able to have a voice, because they didn’t have a voice for so long. So, I don’t want to shut them down in any way.”
“If I’ve done something wrong, I will fix it. I have to.”
Help is available.
If you require immediate assistance, please call 000.
If you’d like to speak to someone about sexual violence, please call the 1800 Respect hotline on 1800 737 732 or chat online.
Under 25? You can reach Kids Helpline at 1800 55 1800 or chat online.
