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Dave Franco: "Zac Efron Broke His Hand on My Balls"

Today in celebrity gossip: Dave Franco finally and officially eclipsed brother James as America's Best Franco, Sanaa Lathan has a scary stalker problem, and Jason Biggs talked trash on Tara Reid.

By Price Peterson
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Today in celebrity gossip: Dave Franco finally and officially eclipsed brother James as America's Best Franco, Sanaa Lathan has a scary stalker problem, and Jason Biggs talked trash on Tara Reid.

After a quick, informal poll of all my friends (a seagull and a fern), 100% of us agree that James Franco is no longer fun to think about. Sure, there was the initial novelty of a former teen hunk actor taking up the cause of gay rights and going back to school and dabbling in post-modern performance art about whatever had occurred to him that afternoon. But like Lady Gaga's well-intentioned and immediately insufferable "Born This Way" single, 'the gays' realized very quickly they no longer needed to be spoken for by these people. And performance art or academia enthusiasts don't need a semi-articulate scenester to tell them about life's finer pretensions. Anyway, in addition to James Franco's increasingly patronizing hobbies he's also done tons of annoying things that would be charming if we were still into him as a person: Hosting the Oscars, playing some kind of Oz wizard, remaking Cruising deleted scenes, taking super unflattering Instagram selfies, and recently, writing a not-at-all-veiled short story about Lindsay Lohan. The same informal poll I mentioned earlier also found that 66% of us would, if given a wishbone, wish away James Franco. (33% of participants would swallow the wishbone whole and fly away.) Sorry, but the stats don't lie. This is all inessential build-up to what we're really going to talk about right now, and that is the undisputed fact that James Franco's smaller brother Dave Franco has finally and officially eclipsed James Franco as America's Best Franco. For one thing, his film work recently has been way better than James Franco's, with the 21 Jump Street Franchise and Warm Bodies and special mention going to his fun supporting role in the recent art film Neighbors. Sure, Dave Franco hasn't really done super-serious dramatic work, but it's time we stop equating 'serious' with 'good' anyway. Also Dave Franco has started giving very good interviews in which he more or less sighs at brother James' antics. Here's what Dave Franco recently told The Daily Beast about those infamous James Franco selfies:

I'm not the one to tell him to stop posting naked pictures of himself on Instagram—not that I'm necessarily rushing to check these pictures out—but he can do what he wants.

Supportive but dismissive! Sounds about right. But that's all prelude to the fact that Dave Franco is now claiming that Zac Efron injured his hand on the set of Neighbors in a way that Efron hasn't been 100% honest about:

Well...he can claim it was on a mantel, but I'm 98 percent sure it was upon impact of my balls. It was a typical stand-off where we're holding on to each other's balls and we were wearing cups over our junk, and I really do think that he came in hard and literally fractured his hand. . . So, regardless of what happens in my career from here on out, I can always fall back on the fact that Zac Efron broke his hand on my balls.

Case closed. Dave Franco is America's Best Franco. To celebrate let us now revisit the finale of this Funny or Die video for the one thousandth time:

Step up your game, James Franco! [E! Online]

Quick question: Does it seem like there are more and scarier stalker stories lately, or are we just hearing about them more often? There was that time recently that Sandra Bullock was menaced by a machine gun-owning fan plus the myriad stalkers who've been breaking into the homes of Taylor Swift, Selena Gomez, Miley Cyrus, and any number of young female stars. Well, add one more to that: Sanaa Lathan, the should-be-way-more-famous star of Love & Basketball, The Best Man Holiday, and best of all, Blade, became the target of a crazed fan when contractors at her home discovered him sleeping in her laundry room. Apparently Shawn Caples, 28, claimed to be Lathan's husband and returned a short while later only to be discovered on the premises by Lathan herself. After she called the police he apparently fled only to return again a few days later. Thankfully he was promptly arrested and Lathan has since obtained a restraining order, but still: That's three times a guy broke into a woman's well-protected house seemingly effortlessly. It's just such a bummer when it seems like Lifetime movies are actual documentaries, you know? [Page Six]

Soaring to greater and greater heights of inessential celebrity gossip reporting, Page Six now claims that, get this, Robert Pattinson flirted with Katy Perry. According to Page Six's source, the two celebrities were spotted standing on the same outdoor patio and "were heavily flirting." At one point Pattinson, the bafflingly bone-structured Twilight actor, was seen pointing Perry out to a buddy and proclaiming "She’s so [bleeping] hot." Ah, summer love. "Summer lovin’ had me a blast, Summer lovin’, happened so fast, I met a girl [so bleeping hot], I met a boy [from Twilight]." Guys, I don't know. [Page Six]

By now you've likely heard that radio icon Casey Kasem has passed away, bringing to a close (at least temporarily) the intense, frequently insane legal battles between his family over his well-being. From secret nursing homes to weaponized hamburger meat to Bible allegories to allegations of elder abuse, this story has never stopped being sad and lurid and heartbreaking. But can we all please stop pretending that Kasem's single greatest contribution to pop culture wasn't his role on Scooby-Doo? Yeah, yeah, Top 40, Ryan Seacrest mentor, whatever. Shaggy was, as your great aunt might say, 'da bomb.' Here's a nice tweet from one of Kasem's most important co-stars from a latter day iteration of the animated gang:

E! has more very nice tributes to our fallen stoner and the man who brought him to stoned life. [Page Six, E! Online]

Jason Biggs, an actor who may have won some kind of lottery when he scored the lead role in American Pie, has nonetheless hung on career-wise ever since and has even become associated with a watercooler hit in Orange Is the New Black. Contrast that to fellow American Pie alum Tara Reid, whose recent starring role in Sharknado aside has been mostly known for wading in the canals of Venice Beach talking to her hair. Anyway, Jason Biggs recently went on John Rivers' public access show (?) In Bed With Joan where Rivers invited him to compare the merits of Lindsay Lohan's body to Tara Reid's:

[Lindsay Lohan’s got nice boobs. She really does. Lindsay’s got nice boobs. Tara’s body, I don’t know what’s going on with it. I don’t think she ever knows what’s going on with it.

Ugh. Cool comparison. Us Weekly reminds us that back in the fall Biggs also once called Reid "a hot mess" during an episode of Watch What Happens and it had hurt Reid's feelings big time:

So anyway, after this most recent "diss," Biggs offered a retraction SORT OF in the the form of a series of tweets pinning the blame for this body-shaming onto the tabloids themselves and claiming that appearing on a comedy show absolves him from any and all trash talk. Biggs' "apology" also includes the classic phrase "Sorry if I offended you" which as we all know is not an apology. To her credit Tara Reid has not responded in any way to this new dust-up. Which, fine. Keep frolicking on those beaches, Tara Reid, YOU LOOK GOOD BB. [Us Weekly]

Whoops, Colton Haynes fell asleep in a bathtub again, somebody wake him up:

Miley Cyrus posted a pre-shower selfie and possibly came out as a never-nude:

And finally, Austin Mahone flips for you, falls for you, and tumbles for you:

This article is from the archive of our partner The Wire.