January 13, 2018
Actress Ashley Judd, who is a longtime advocate of
women's rights and sexual assault victims, has called actor James Franco's
response to sexual misconduct allegations "terrific".
Judd told Stephen
Sackur, host of "HARDtalk", that she was pleased with Franco's response to
accusations he had acted inappropriately towards a number of women in the past,
reports people.com.
"I think that what James said is terrific. And I
think that we have all behaved, at a certain level, unconsciously, and done
things that were insensitive, inappropriate, without necessarily understanding
that they were," Judd said.
"I mean, we have all operated with a certain
amount of tone deafness, and I like the culpability, and we have to have
restorative justice.
"This is about men and women being all together and
having a more equitable and just workplace, home life, social spaces. I mean, we
know that when women are empowered in the workplace and are in decision-making
positions that workplaces have better financial outcomes and there's less
harassment when there is more diversity," she added.
And it takes that
kind of "individual accountability to collectively make the change on a large
scale".
Controversy around Franco started to erupt on January 7, when he
appeared at the Golden Globes and two women accused him of sexual misconduct and
inappropriate behaviour on Twitter.
Then an article published in the Los
Angeles Times on January 11, five women accused the actor of abusing his power
as an acting teacher and mentor in a sexually exploitative manner.
Franco's attorney, Michael Plonsker, denied each of the women's allegations, and
cited Franco's comments on "The Late Show With Stephen Colbert" as his formal
denial.
"Look, in my life I pride myself on taking responsibility for
things that I have done," Franco told Colbert.
"I have to do that to
maintain my well being. 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. So I don't want to shut them
down in any way."
A source told people.com: "He's in a really bad place.
His close friends are trying to be there for him but it's been hard - he's only
talking to a select group of people. For now, he's just hiding out."