James Franco says it’s “hard to talk about†his Oscar-hosting gig “because it’s like assigning blame.†But blame doesn’t assign itself! Franco tells this month’s Playboy that his low-energy performance was simply a response to feeling “trapped†in material that was “not [his] boat.†Franco says he was particularly worried about his drag bit. “The plan had been that I was going to sing as Cher and then Cher was going to come out onstage; that got axed when Cher and the song from Burlesque weren’t nominated,†he says, reminding us yet again of what could have been. “Me in drag is not funny,†he says, which is almost true, but it is at least a little bit funny. Franco went along with the Marilyn Monroe getup because he “didn’t want to argue anymore,†nor did he want to be “one of the many cooks doing the writing.†According to Franco, “There were a lot of cooks who shouldn’t have been cooking but were allowed to. There were some cooks my manager tried to bring in, like Judd Apatow, who wrote some very funny stuff that wasn’t used.†So just to be clear: We could have had Judd Apatow bits and Cher performances on the Oscars last year. But we did not. [HuffPo]