July 2008 - James Franco's been keeping busy in dramatic films for the past decade, finally revisiting the comedy genre with a starring role opposite Seth Rogen in Pineapple Express. He's following up that funny film with a return to something more serious in the Harvey Milk biopic Milk, directed by Gus Van Sant.
At the press conference for Pineapple Express, Franco described his interest in making Milk. "I've been a huge fan of Gus Van Sant since the early days with Drugstore Cowboy, My Own Private Idaho. I watched those before I was even an actor and I loved them. So it was basically a chance to work with two of my heroes, Gus and Sean Penn. We shot in San Francisco and it was an amazing experience."
Milk revolves around murdered San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk, the first openly gay man to hold public office. Sean Penn plays Milk and Franco tackles the role of Scott Smith, Harvey Milk's lover. "I think they were together the longest of all of Harvey's relationships," explained Franco. "They met in New York and Scott was a struggling actor. Harvey was a businessman fully in the closet. And then one day – I don't know how sudden it was, but eventually he decided he didn't want to live that way anymore and so they both moved out to San Francisco and were part of the gay movement at the time. They opened the camera shop together which has become famous - Castro Camera. That's where Harvey then eventually ran his campaigns out of, that store. They knew nothing about cameras and I think that Scott knew even less about politics, but he ran Harvey's early career. He was his campaign manager. Harvey ran four times, and I think that Scott was the campaign manager for the first one."
Franco had to rely on research in order to get into the role as he never got to meet the real man. "He passed away in the mid '90s. But after Harvey died he was known as the Widow Milk. Even though they had broken up before, he kind of took over his estate and inherited all of the stuff," said Franco, adding, "It's good. It's really good."
