James Franco Book Quotations

If you just read the book, you're taking in the narrative, you're taking in the characters, you're understanding it in a certain way. If you make a movie it's really an act of translation.

Most of the books that I've adapted I'm doing because I love the book and I feel like it's a great work of art in itself, and when it's a great book I feel as a director or a writer that I have a responsibility to rise to the level of the original. It makes me try to reach higher.

Adapting a book is essentially a collaboration, whether the author is alive or dead.

I loved the book [The Adderall Diaries] I optioned it, I think some years ago. But there's a lot of different threads in the book. It starts off as one thing, where he's trying to cover this murder trial, and then his own life starts to impinge on that, so it becomes something else. I found that fascinating.

I have a lot of books optioned. This one sat around for a while - part of that was just because I was trying to figure it out, and I didn't realize I needed Pam [Romanowski] to figure it out - but I'm not somebody that likes to option books and then sit on them.

When I read the book [The Adderall Diaries] I loved it, and I maybe had an inkling that there was a lot of good material in there. I didn't quite know at the time how to adapt it into a film, but I hoped I would figure it out one day.

I think it helps the writers to sell their books if they announce my attachment. But it doesn't mean that I'm going to make the movies in the next year or two or three.