- Culture
- 09 Oct 18
Busy Philipps Claims "Bully" James Franco Assaulted Her
Actress Busy Philipps, who earlier this month revealed that she was sexually assaulted when she was 14, has now claimed that she was assaulted by her co-star James Franco on the set of Freaks and Geeks.
“He grabbed both my arms and screamed in my face, ‘DON’T EVER TOUCH ME AGAIN!' And he threw me to the ground. Flat on my back. Wind knocked out of me," Busy Philipps is said to have written in her upcoming memoir, This Will Only Hurt A Little, about the alleged incident with James Franco.
She claims the incident left her in tears and that Franco was a “fucking bully" on set and that he was never formally reprimanded for his behaviour.
Earlier this year, Franco was accused of sexual misconduct and inappropriate behaviour by five women. But the actor denied the allegations.
Earlier this month, Busy Philipps opened up about being raped when she was just 14. She had tears in her eyes when she opened up in a TV interview earlier this month (3 October) about her horrific ordeal of being sexually assaulted when she was a young teenager.
Back in late September, Busy Philipps first revealed she was raped at 14 to her 1.2 million followers on Instagram. Busy has now written about the ordeal in her upcoming memoir This Will Only Hurt a Little, which will be published on 16 October.
“This is me at 14. The age I was raped. It’s taken me 25 years to say those words. I wrote about it in my book," she wrote on Instagram. "I finally told my parents and sister about it 4 months ago. Today is the day we are silent no more. All of us. I'm scared to post this. I can't imagine what Dr. Ford is feeling right now.
She spoke some more about the ordeal on (Wednesday, 3 October) on the Ellen show. On the verge of tears, Busy Philipps told Ellen: "I have a 10-year-old. So when I look at [myself at 14], I’m like, seeing my kid.”
The Freaks and Geeks star also told Ellen: “I’ve struggled with it for so long."
Busy Philipps also told how her mother was devastated when she told her about the rape. “[My mom] felt like she was a failure, that she had failed me and didn’t protect me. I understand that, being a mother, but I was like, ‘But Mom, you’re really the hero of my book,’” Philipps recalls. “She really is. She was really there for me. Without her, I wouldn’t be sitting here with you. So I was like, ‘You did something right. I’m going to talk to Ellen.’”
Explaining why she decided to tell her story now, Busy Philipps told Ellen: “I was so moved by [Dr. Ford’s] bravery. And it wasn’t something that I felt like I was ever going to blast out on social media, but when I saw her standing there, speaking her truth after 30 years, I was like, ‘It’s been 25 [years] for me and I can do this. I can do this. We can all do this.
“And I feel like it’s, politically whatever you believe, I feel like it’s a real moment of reckoning for women that we have, sort of collectively, carried this burden for so long and it’s time to share it and let it out. It was hard. And really scary.”
Busy Philipps admitted that she found it very difficult to write about the sexual assault. "I’ve struggled with it for so long. For so long. And even when I wrote the chapter in my book I had in my head an escape plan, which was it doesn’t have to go into the book if I panic and don’t want to put it out into the world. But I feel like we’re at this moment in time," she said.
Speaking about her book in general, the 39-year-old actress told Ellen: “I’ve been kind of waiting my whole life for someone to ask me to write a book about myself, you know what I mean? So I was ready to go.
"But I did want to have it be a little bit revealing because I feel like there are the fun Hollywood stories -- I’ve been an actor in this business since I was 19 years old and there’s all that fun stuff -- but I also was really interested in where I came from and sort of the harder things in my life I’ve faced. I wanted to put that in there for people as well. So I did that.”
