James Franco Says He Tried To Help Lindsay Lohan With Her Troubles

James Franco has known Lindsay Lohan since 2006, and though there was an awkward period where he reportedly rebuffed her romantic advances, he now claims that he "tried to help" the starlet through her troubles, but to no avail.

Franco and Lohan last hung out he was directing her in R.E.M's music video "Blue" in February of 2011, but he told MTV, "I haven't talked to her in a long time because it seemed like she was getting into some more trouble."

Franco added, "Lindsay and I had reconnected at that time. I had been writing some poems about the Chateau Marmont and one or two of the poems involved Lindsay ... I think one of the reasons it's so hard is when she gets in trouble, she gets all this attention and I'm sure she gets book offers. Like she goes to jail, and instead of feeling like, 'I really hit a low place,' she'll get a crazy offer for her jail memoir."

In case you missed it, this was the video the two shot together nearly two years ago: