Tom Franco

Franco was born in Palo Alto, California. His mother, Betsy Lou (née Verne), is a writer and occasional actor. His father, Douglas Eugene Franco (d. 2011), ran a Silicon Valley business,[4][5] and was a "philanthropic entrepreneur".[6] Franco's father was of Portuguese (Madeiran) and Swedish descent.[7] Franco's mother is from a family of Russian Jewish ancestry; her parents had changed the surname from "Verovitz" to "Verne."[8] Tom is the middle child of three brothers; the older is actor, director, writer, and artist James Franco and the younger is actor Dave Franco. They were raised in Palo Alto.[6]

Franco is a graduate of Palo Alto High School, class of 1998.[9] He graduated in 2002 from University of California, Santa Cruz majoring in fine art,[9] then attended California College of the Arts in Oakland, California, majoring in ceramics.[6]

Franco started acting professionally in the comedy horror film Basket Case 2 (1990), credited as Frog Boy. He subsequently appeared in A Peace of History (2005) and The Devil Wears a Toupee (2007).[10] He had a small role in The Disaster Artist (2017), in which his brothers played the lead roles.

Franco is the founder and co-director of Berkeley’s Firehouse Art Collective.[6] He shared directorship with his wife Julia Lazar Franco who died in 2014.[11]

Franco's first wife, Julia Lazar (1957–2014),[12] worked closely with him. Her death was a result of liver failure (brought on by hepatitis C and liver cancer)[13] and kidney trouble. The two were married in a hospital solarium about a month before her death.[14] In 2015, Franco married Iris Torres, a film producer.

• Tom Franco at IMDb