Sponsored message
Logged in as
Audience-funded nonprofit news
radio tower icon laist logo
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
Subscribe
  • Listen Now Playing Listen

This is an archival story that predates current editorial management.

This archival content was written, edited, and published prior to LAist's acquisition by its current owner, Southern California Public Radio ("SCPR"). Content, such as language choice and subject matter, in archival articles therefore may not align with SCPR's current editorial standards. To learn more about those standards and why we make this distinction, please click here.

Arts & Entertainment

Professor James Franco Teaching Film This Spring at USC

One year ago, Congress defunded public media. Now that we're 100% community funded, please become a sustaining member or increase your existing membership today.

Students at the University of Southern California may want to take note of a special guest professor who'll be at the lectern this spring. Actor James Franco--err, Professor James Franco--will be teaching a course in which students will create a short film for a collaborative project.Students in the School of Cinematic Arts got word this week via an email that Franco will be co-teaching the course with his business partner Vince Jolivette, according to Movies Now.

Each student will direct a short film no longer than 10 minutes, and the films will be worked together into a project called "The Labyrinth," which is mean to probe "the unknown, the unexplained and the unimaginable."

Of course, Franco is not a newbie at the head of the class; he famously taught a graduate film course last year at New York University in which the students turned poems into films.

Though Movies Now fears Franco will be sidetracked come March when his movie "Oz: The Great and Powerful" comes out, past experience leads us to theorize if he can't be in the classroom he can phone it in via Skype.

We'll have to wait for the syllabus to come out to know if Franco plans to address his own web series about USC, "Undergrads,"which takes a mockumentary-style look at the lives of students at the University of Spoiled Children. And while we've never seen Franco at work in the classroom, if his professor schtick is as lousy as his Oscar hosting, we hope he polishes his act.

One year ago, Congress voted to defund public media, eliminating a critical $1.7 million from our budget every year going forward. But they couldn’t silence us, and we’re not going anywhere. LAist is now 100% community funded and that means we’re taking our future into our own hands and turning to you to keep local reporting strong.

You come to LAist because you want independent reporting and trustworthy local information. Our nonprofit newsroom doesn’t answer to shareholders looking to turn a profit. Instead, we answer to you and our communities. We are free to follow facts wherever they lead and to hold power to account without fear or favor. Our only loyalty is to our readers and listeners and our mission: to inform, engage, and strengthen Southern California’s communities.

If this story helped you, please become a monthly member today to help sustain this mission. It just takes 1 minute to donate below.
Senior Vice President News, Editor in Chief

Make your tax-deductible donation today