James Franco "embarrassed" by encounter with 17-year-old girl
James Franco has addressed the "awkward" encounter he recently had with a 17-year-old Scottish student, opening up about the much-talked-about incident during a visit Friday to "Live! with Kelly and Michael."
His appearance on the show took place the same week text messages and online chats surfaced between him and a young tourist named Lucy Clode. In the exchange, Franco suggested possibly meeting at a hotel -- apparently not realizing her age.
It was initially unclear if the whole story was a farce, but as it turns out -- it wasn't. And Franco, 35, clearly feels pretty weird about the whole thing.
"I didn't want to come on the show and...feel awkward, so uh, yeah. I mean I guess, you know, I'm embarrassed, and I guess I'm just a model of, you know, how social media is tricky," he said. "It's a way people meet each other today. But what I've learned I guess just because I'm new to it is like, you don't know who's on the other end. You meet somebody in person and you get a feel for them but you don't know who you're talking to, and, you know? So I used bad judgment. I learned my lesson."
Franco added, "Unfortunately in my position, I mean...I have a very good life, but not only do I have to go through the embarrassing kind of rituals of kind of meeting someone, sometimes if I do that then it gets, you know, published for the world so now, you know, it's like doubly embarrassing."Watch the interview below: