James Franco. After the allegations of abuse, it will be Fidel Castro. AP photo
American actor, screenwriter, producer and director James Franco will play Fidel Castro in a film directed by the Spanish Miguel Bardem which will retrace the life of his daughter Alina Fernández, who gave her consent in the choice of the protagonist.
The role, confirmed this Thursday 4 August by the specialized Hollywood press, will mean the return to the cinema of James Franco after a series of sex scandals and sexual abuse allegations led him to cancel his projects with the big film studios.
The independently produced film will be titled Alina of Cuba and will see actress Ana Villafañe as the daughter of the leader of the Cuban Revolution, and Mía Maestro as Natalia Revuelta, her mother.
Fidel Castro will have his own biopic, directed by Spaniard Miguel Bardem. photo by Reuters
Castro’s illegitimate daughter
The screenplay will narrate Alina Fernández’s youth as Castro’s illegitimate daughter and her subsequent exile in Spain being an opponent of the Cuban regime.
According to the magazine VarietyIt was Fernández herself, who also produced the film, who chose James Franco to play her father.
The choice is not without controversy, since Franco is one of the names banned in Hollywood in the wake of the #MeToo movement.
The allegations against James Franco
James Franco was chosen by Fidel Castro’s daughter to play her father. AP photo
Since 2018, several women accused Franco of sexual abuse and a group of students reported sexually taking advantage of students attending his acting classes at Studio 4.
The lawsuit was initially filed in 2019 by Sarah Tither-Kaplan and Toni Gaal, who enrolled in their course in 2014 and claimed that Franco was giving lessons on sex scenes that consisted of “simulations of sex acts that went way beyond industry standards“.
The complaint was joined by other students who indicated that the actor recorded some women during rehearsals and approached the young women promising jobs on Hollywood projects that never materialized.
Therefore, James Franco signed a victim settlement for which he paid $ 2.3 million to be distributed among those affected.
In addition to Bardem’s project, the actor will also participate in the war drama me youby British director Billie August.
Mia Maestro will play the role of Natalia Revuelta, lover of Fidel Castro and mother of his illegitimate daughter. Photo Nestor Sieira
The video with Amber Heard
Another scandal accompanied James Franco last year, although it touched him sideways. It was his relationship with actress Amber Heard that came to light the libel suit you initiated Johnny Depp.
During one of the interrogations in the trial, the actress admitted that on May 22, 2016, the night before she filed for divorce from her then husband, she was with James Franco in his apartment.
The 36-year-old actress had previously denied being accompanied by Franco that night, but Johnny Depp’s lawyers played a video from the security cameras during the trial of the building elevator that disproved Heard’s version.
In the clip, you can see how Heard takes the elevator, goes down to the parking lot of her Los Angeles building, and lets a man (it would be Franco) in to go up with her. Knowing that there is a camera that records themthe two turn against each other and hide. The timestamp on the video shows that it was taken on May 22, 2016, around 11pm.
Source: EFE
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Source: Clarin
