James Franco lightens up for role in Oz the Great and Powerful

Instead of Johnny Depp and Robert Downey Jr, the film-maker picked Franco to play the lead.

LOS ANGELES: Actor James Franco, lauded for his serious roles and forays into art, was almost too earnest to land the lead in the big screen 3D adventure film Oz the Great and Powerful, which opens on Friday ahead of the summer blockbuster season.

Film-maker Sam Raimi, who directed Franco in the Spider-Man trilogy from 2002 to 2007, said he initially considered other heavyweight actors such as Johnny Depp and Robert Downey Jr for the lead role in Disney’s big-budget unofficial prequel to the 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz.

Both Depp and Downey have already spearheaded two juggernaut Disney blockbuster franchises, with Depp as raucous Captain Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean and Downey as the main character in Iron Man.

Franco has not carried a blockbuster film alone, but Raimi told Reuters the 34-year-old actor’s maturation would enable him to do so in Oz, in which he plays the charming, morally dubious circus magician who cons others on and off stage.

When the character lands in Oz he continues his unethical ways, but becomes a reluctant hero after tapping into his inner goodness.

“I started thinking about what I knew about James in real life and realised they were very similar to Oz’s,” Raimi said.

“James started out as a 21-year-old actor, was a little into himself, a little selfish, a womaniser. But he had a good heart.”

When Franco and Raimi worked together on Spider-Man, the actor was a relative newcomer in Hollywood, playing the supporting role of Harry Osborn to Toby Maguire’s Peter Park/Spider-Man.

Franco, who stars alongside actors Michelle Williams, Mila Kunis and Rachel Weisz in Oz, admitted that he lacked the maturity as a performer to play a character like the wizard when he supported Maguire in the Spider-Man franchise.

“I was still in a stage where I think I took acting too seriously,” Franco told Reuters in a recent interview. “I couldn’t relax in the roles. There was a kind of strangulation of the performances that was going on.”

In recent years, Franco has undertaken several ventures outside of acting, including writing a book of poetry, curating an art exhibition in Los Angeles, engaging in performance art and teaching screenwriting at the University of California-Los Angeles.

The actor also stepped behind the camera as director on numerous projects including this year’s LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender-related) film, Interior. Leather Bar.

Preoccupied with his serious artistic endeavors, Franco credited the 2008 stoner comedy Pineapple Express with loosening him up as an actor and allowing him to embrace the lighter side of filmmaking.

“That movie really taught me that movie-making could be fun, that I don’t need to have complete control over everything, that if I relax, my performances will be better,” he said.

“I thought I needed to be this young, serious brooding performer,” Franco added. “And I was just blind to the value of comedy.”

Published in The Express Tribune, March 9^th, 2013.                   

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