James Franco solves the lawsuit of sexual conduct brought by former students

LOS ANGELES (AP) – An interim solution has been reached in a lawsuit alleging that James Franco intimidated students at an acting and film school he founded in free and exploitative sexual situations, they said Saturday plaintiffs’ lawyers.

The two sides filed a joint report of the situation at the Los Angeles Superior Court, telling a judge that a settlement of the class action process initiated by former students at the now defunct school, Studio 4, has been reached, although elements of the process may continue.

The document was filed on February 11, but the settlement has not been reported before.

Actresses and former students Sarah Tither-Kaplan and Toni Gaal, who first filed the lawsuit in 2019, have agreed to drop individual claims under the agreement, according to the court file. Their trial said Franco pushed his students to play in increasingly explicit sex scenes in the room in an “orgy-type setting” that far exceeded what was acceptable on Hollywood movie sets.

He claimed that Franco “sought to create a conduit for young women who were subjected to his personal and professional sexual exploitation in the name of education” and that students were led to believe that the roles in Franco’s films would be available to those who went .

The trial showed that the incidents took place in a master class on sex scenes that Franco taught at Studio 4, which opened in 2014 and closed in 2017.

The two sides have been in talks for a solution for several months, and the progress of the process has been interrupted while they were talking.

The plaintiffs’ attorneys at Valli Kane & Vagnini, LLP, confirmed the agreement in a statement to the Associated Press on Saturday evening, adding that it will be “further memorized in a joint settlement to be filed with the Court at a later date.” ”, But without providing any other comments or details.

Afternoon emails requesting comments from attorneys for the defendants were not returned immediately.

In a previous court case, Franco’s lawyers, while praising the #MeToo movement that helped inspire the lawsuit, called his statements “false and inflammatory, without legal basis and brought as a class action with the obvious goal of attracting as much publicity as possible – hungry applicants. “They emphasized that Tither-Kaplan had previously expressed his gratitude for the opportunity to work with Franco.

The lawsuit also names Franco Rabbit Bandini’s production company and its partners, including Vince Jolivette and Jay Davis, as defendants.

The allegations of sexual exploitation of other plaintiffs in the class action will be rejected without prejudice, which means that they can be re-filed, according to the joint situation report.

The allegations of fraud brought by these applicants will be “subject to limited release”, the document states, without further details or explanations.

The document does not disclose how much money could be involved in the transaction.

Prior to the trial, Tither-Kaplan aired allegations of sexual conduct against Franco along with other women in the Los Angeles Times after Franco won a Golden Globe Award for “The Disaster Artist” in early 2018, when the wave of the #MeToo movement was sweeping Hollywood.

In a later interview with The Colate Show with Stephen Colbert, Franco called inaccurate stories of sexual misconduct about him, but said, “If I did something wrong, I’ll fix it. Must.”

Franco, 42, best known for starring in comedies with Seth Rogen, has generally kept a low profile, as the allegations came at an extremely productive time, culminating in the acclaimed ” artist in case of disaster ”.