Mike Fleming

EXCLUSIVE: 127 Hours star James Franco has acquired Stephen Elliott’s The Adderall Diaries, which he intends to adapt, direct and star in. The memoir starts off a bit like In Cold Blood, in that a blocked writer turns to a murder trial to get himself going. Elliott, blocked for two years, reports on the trial of Hans Reiser, a computer programmer charged with killing the wife he met through a Russian dating service. Fueled by Adderall, a methamphetamine prescribed to help ADHD sufferers, Elliott’s stream of consciousness prose veers into subjects that include his cruel father, Paris Hilton, and S&M.

Franco takes on this challenge at a time when he is cutting a wide swath as an actor and director. He’ll figure prominently in the Best Actor race for his portrayal as Aron Ralston in the Danny Boyle-directed 127 Hours, and he’s currently starring in Fox’s big budget Planet of the Apes prequel Rise of the Apes, which Fox releases June 24, 2011. He plays Allen Ginsburg in Howl, and completed a role in General Hospital as the evil performance artist Franco. As a filmmaker, his documentary feature Saturday Night was recently acquired by Howl distributor Oscilloscope Laboratories, and his short film, The Clerk’s Tale, is screening in competition next month in the Hamptons Film Festival. Franco puts his own projects together under the Rabbit Bandini label with partners Miles Levy and Vince Jolivette. WME repped him and the author.