‘Hhmmm, if I sit here long enough stroking my chin and staring at this book cover, then someone might photograph me and people will forget I made ‘Your Highness’ and remember how arty I am.’

The first time I realised that modern day renaissance man James Franco was more than just the guy who played Peter Parker’s bfbnfbhkhf* in Spiderman was a couple of years ago in Paris. I was in one of the Latin Quarter’s tourist trap restaurants with a friend when the camp, middle-aged frenchman dining alone on the table next to us asked what films we’d seen recently. The conversation went something like this:

My friend: Um, I saw Pineapple Express.

Strange Man: Oh, who plays in this Pineapple Express?

My friend: An actor called James Franco is in it.

Strange Man: Oh! James Franco! Yes I know James Franco. What other films have you seen?

Me: Well, I did watch Harry Potter the other day.

Strange Man: Is James Franco in this one?

Me: Uh, no. He isn’t.

Strange Man: Ah, I see. Have you seen any other films with James Franco in?

Me: Um, Spiderman.

Strange Man: And did you like James Franco in this one?

Me: Yeah, I s’pose.

Strange Man: So what other films have you seen with James Franco in?

And so on and so on it went. I detected that the man had a soft spot for James Franco. Since then the Franc’s numerous artistic and academic ventures (books, artshows, albums, creative writing masters to name a few) have seen his value rise dramatically. I feel absolutely certain in my  statistical estimations when I say that in the last year 50% of all cultural magazine and sunday supplement article headlines have been a variation on the sentence ‘James Franco does a lot of different things’. Ever ready to go to extreme lengths to get the latest lowbrow culture lowdown, I concocted an elaborate plan to break into his house undetected and see if I could get a heads up on any of his future projects. The plan is too elaborate to go into here so I won’t bore you with the details, instead I shall just provide  my findings.

*bfbnfbhkhf = best friend but not forever because he kills his father