Busy Philipps Says James Franco Assaulted Her While Filming ‘Freaks and Geeks’

Busy Philipps accused James Franco of assaulting her while filming Freaks and Geeks in her new memoir, calling the actor a “f— bully.”

On Monday, Radar Online published an excerpt from her new book, This Will Only Hurt A Little. In the excerpt, which was verified by Entertainment Weekly, Philipps said it was difficult to work with Franco. In one particular incident, a director asked her to hit Franco in the chest. Franco grabbed her, screamed at her to never touch him again and threw her to the ground.

“Flat on my back. Wind knocked out of me. Immediately, I could feel the wet hot stinging of tears, but I tried like hell to suck them back in,” Philipps wrote.

They filmed one more take, and she ran to co-star Linda Cardellini in tears. On the following day, producer Judd Apatow told Franco to apologize. After watching the scene on tape, Franco told Philipps his behavior “was pretty mean.”

The excerpt was published days after Philipps said she was raped when she was 14 years old, after Dr. Christine Blasey Ford testified about Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh allegedly sexually assaulting her in 1982. In her book, Philipps goes into more details of other traumatic experiences with boys while in high school in Arizona.

Philipps alleges she was sexually assaulted by an older boy in his car when she was 14. Three years layer, a 17-year-old left her bloody and bruised, but she did not tell her family. She went to group therapy for troubled teens after she began cutting herself.

“This is me at 14. The age I was raped,” Philipps wrote on Instagram, alongside a high school year book photo. “It’s taken me 25 years to say those words. I wrote about it in my book. I finally told my parents and sister about it 4 months ago. Today is the day we are silent no more. All of us. I’m scared to post this. I can’t imagine what Dr. Ford is feeling right now.”

Franco, Cordellini and Apatow did not comment on Philipps’ book.

This is not the first time Franco has been accused of harassment. In January, five women accused him of sexually inappropriate behavior in an expose published in the Los Angeles Times. Franco later responded to the allegations as “not accurate” when he appeared on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.

“The things that I heard that were on Twitter are not accurate, but I completely support people coming out and being able to have a voice because they didn’t have a voice for so long,” he told Colbert. “So, I don’t want to shut them down in any way. It’s a good thing and I support it.”

After the allegations went public, HBO still went forward with his series The Deuce, which was renewed for a third and final season last month.

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