Charlyne Yi Reacts To Seth Rogen’s Refusal To Work With James Franco
Charlyne Yi took to Instagram with a checklist for Seth Rogen in response to his claims that he is cutting off future professional projects with James Franco amid Franco’s ongoing sexual misconduct scandal.
35-year-old Yi captioned the post:
“Checklist for SR. I forgot anyone’s name please let me know and I’ll add it in the caption.
Edit – also apologize to: Toni Gaal
Correction: survivors, victims, those harmed”
The Los Angeles native previously called out Rogen last month for being an enabler of Franco's behavior. Yi said in an Instagram post in April that “Seth Rogen was one of the producers on this film (Disaster Artist) so he definitely knows about the bribe and why I quit. Seth also did a sketch on SNL with Franco enabling Franco preying on children. Right after Franco was caught. Franco has a long history of preying on children.” In the post, Yi said that “enablers are just as toxic and are abusers too.”
Rogen’s SNL appearance joked about a “prank” he played on Franco, where he said he “posed as a girl on Instagram, told him I was WAY young. He seemed unfazed. I have a date to meet him at the Ace Hotel.”
Yi asked that Rogen should “apologize to survivors by making their lives even more vulnerable by publicly siding with an abuser, further damaging their careers and safety.” She added that he needs to commit to educating himself about coercion, sexual assault, and how to be a protective ally; and to promote, protect and hire survivors of sexual abuse.
As we previously reported, Rogen finally spoke out on his relationship standing with Franco saying, “What I can say is that I despise abuse and harassment and I would never cover or conceal the actions of someone doing it, or knowingly put someone in a situation where they were around someone like that. However, I do look back at a joke I made on Saturday Night Live in 2014 and I very much regret making that joke. It was a terrible joke, honestly.”
Yi and Rogen also worked together on 2007’s Knocked Up. Among the projects Rogen and Franco worked together on included NBC’s cult classic Freaks and Geeks and films such as Pineapple Express, This Is the End, The Disaster Artist, and The Interview.
In February, we reported that a settlement deal has been reached for the 2019 lawsuit alleging that James Franco intimidated his students into gratuitous and exploitative sexual situations at the acting school he founded. Two of Franco’s former students at his now defunct Studio 4 school, Sarah Tither-Kaplan and Toni Gaal, have agreed to drop their individual claims.
