Photo: Splash Images

Few can say they’ve hosted the Academy Awards, written a book, and have taught a college course (about themselves) all in one lifetime. Even fewer of those people have done all of this before the age of 35. But we know of one person: James Franco. With news about him playing the lead in Hugh Hefner’s biopic film on top of recently writing his own novel, Actors Anonymous—a supposed fictionialized account of his experiences as an actor—we had to ask ourselves, is there anything James Franco thinks he can’t do? The maverick’s first breakthrough role was on the unfortunately short-lived TV show Freaks and Geeks in ’99 but started gaining recognition for the television movie James Dean, which landed him a Golden Globe award. Since then, he’s starred as Tobey Maguire’s best friend-turned-enemy Harry Osborn in Spider-man and Spider-man 2 and taken on a recurring role on ABC’s soap opera General Hospital. His other films include Tristan and Isolde, Milk, 127 Hours, and most recently Rise of the Planet of the Apes. So, what do we love about the do-it-all dreamboat? better question might be, what’s there not to love? Besides his ability to play both a gay lover in Milk and a hilarious loveable stoner in Pineapple Express, the boy’s got skills aside from the big screen. Franco returned to UCLA where he earned his undergrad degree in 2008. He then moved to NYC for graduate school at Columbia University’s writing program and NYU’s Tisch School of Arts, where he graduated with his MFA in both 2010 and 2011. He is currently a PhD student in English at Yale University and just last fall taught a course about film making at NYU (we don’t know how those students found the concentration). The James-of-all-trades is also in talks to write and direct the Hollywood version of William Faulkner’s iconic novel, As I Lay Dying. We literally don’t know how he does it; we can barely balance school and a social life! Whatever his secret is, we’re honored to add to his accolades by crowning him ELLEgirl’s crush of the week.