James Franco has admitted he is “embarrassed” over the leaked Instagram and text-message conversation where he tried to hit on a 17-year-old Scottish girl.
Franco, 35, appeared on “Live with Kelly & Michael” today and said he was feeling “awkward” after the girl, Lucy Clode, posted all of his messages on Instagram, which included, “When is your birthday? Where are you staying?….What’s the hotel? Should I rent a room?”
Franco told Kelly Ripa and Michael Strahan, “I was just feeling awkward. I didn’t want to come on the show and just feel awkward. So yeah. I mean, I guess I’m embarrassed.
“I guess I’m just a model of how social media is tricky. You know, it’s a way people meet each other today. But what I’ve learned I guess just because I’m new to it, you don’t know who is on the other end. You meet somebody in person and you get a feel for them, but you don’t know who you are talking to [online]. So I used bad judgment and I learned my lesson.
“Fortunately, in my position I have a very good life, but not only do I have to go through the embarrassing kind of rituals of meeting someone, sometimes if I do that, then it gets published for the world.
“So now, you know, it’s like doubly embarrassing.”
He and Clode met after she saw him perform in Broadway’s “Of Mice and Men” and waited outside the theater, tagging a photo of them together. Franco then started a conversation, urging her to meet up with him. But Clode wasn’t convinced, telling him, “You sound so dodgy,” and instead of meeting up with him, she posted the entire conversation on Instagram.
Some speculated that the move could be a publicity stunt to promote his new movie “Palo Alto,” in which he plays a creepy older soccer coach who seduces his 14-year-old baby sitter, played by Emma Stone.