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James Franco to Lead Crazy 'Crack-Up At The Race Riots' Adaptation?

by Ethan Anderton
February 11, 2014

Following Spring Breakers last year, the talents of director Harmony Korine and actor James Franco might turn in some even more strange cinematic fare. The New York Post (via The Playlist) recently spoke with the rappers ATL Twins (they were part of Franco's crew in Spring Breakers) where they revealed a new project with Franco involved, and it's based on an older piece of writing from Korine. Supposedly ATL Twins are working with Franco on an adaptation of Korine's 1998 novel A Crack-Up at the Race Riots where Franco would "be like a KKK leader" and the rappers are "his goons." But that's not the weirdest part.

Korine's novel, which was just reissued last year, is set in a crazy world that is a little too crazy for us to explain without sounding like we're on drugs. So we'll let the official synopsis do the talking:

This debut novel from an underground filmmaker uses print, photographs, drawings, news clippings, handwriting, a poem, attempted diagrams, and clip art to enhance the text, which primarily tells of a race war that happens in Florida, where the Jewish people sit in trees, the black people are run by MC Hammer, and the white people are run by Vanilla Ice. Or as the author himself described it front of a national television audience, "I wanted to write the Great American Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Novel." In actuality, it is a collection of hard-luck stories, off-and-on-color jokes, script scraps, found letters, free rhymes, drug flashbacks, and other missing scenes, all exploring the world of show business with fingers prying in the cracks and feet set lightly in the black humors of the real world. With chapters about books found in Monty Clift's basement and Tupac Shakur's 10 favorite novels, and a set of 11 suicide notes with room included for the reader's signature, the book is a one-of-a-kind post-postmodern examination of the dangers of public life from a unique voice in independent culture, one that might make William S. Burroughs sigh and turn the page at least.

The only information about this book being turned into a feature film has come from the ATL Twins, so we don't know if this is just a glimmer in James Franco's eye or if Korine is maybe trying to get the adaptation off the ground. Either way, this sounds like a positively bonkers story, but perfect for the talents that made Spring Breakers such an acclaimed film last year. Of course, a film like this sounds infinitely harder to sell and much more expensive to make, so we'll see if this is even a viable project. Sound interesting?

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