James Franco accuser Sarah Tither-Kaplan has shut down attempts to compare the star to disgraced producer Harvey Weinstein.
After movie mogul Weinstein was accused of sexual harassment and rape by multiple women in October (17), numerous other Hollywood heavyweights have had allegations of sexual misconduct leveled against them.
Recent Golden Globe winner Franco is one of the latest, with actresses Tither-Kaplan and Violet Paley coming forward on social media earlier this month (Jan18) to accuse him of inappropriate behavior, allegations which he has called “not accurate”.
The two women appeared on Good Morning America on Tuesday (23Jan18) to talk about their experiences, but when asked where Franco falls on the spectrum of Hollywood men “behaving badly”, Tither-Kaplan said he was nothing like Weinstein.
“James is absolutely not a Harvey Weinstein,” she stated. “He is not an unfeeling monster who has no sense of reality. He created exploitative environments for non-celebrity women on his sets and I also think James is a talented and valuable person.
“It is a pyramid and at the top is rape and sexual violence and at the bottom are the other abuses of power that when they continue to happen over and over build and build and build and create a culture that allows the most heinous examples of sexual violence and misogyny and discrimination to happen and if we allow any of them, we’re allowing all of them.”
Tither-Kaplan’s complaint comes from a scene she filmed with the actor and director for movie The Long Home in 2015, where she says he removed protective plastic guards covering other actresses’ vaginas before continuing to simulate oral sex on them.
Paley had a romantic relationship with Franco the following year, and recalls that he pressured her into performing oral sex on him while sitting in her car. However, she continued her romance with him, something she now regrets doing.
“I am regretful. I was young, he was a celebrity that I looked up to,” she said, after admitting the nature of their relationship complicates her story.
On Saturday, Scarlett Johansson called out Franco at the Women’s March in Los Angeles.
“I want my pin back, by the way,” she said, referencing the actor wearing a Time’s Up pin to the Golden Globes to support the anti-sexual harassment movement.
