Noted sleep-deprived grad student/part-time thespian James Franco was scheduled to deliver the commencement address at UCLA next Friday (What, was Skeet Ulrich not available?), but he backed out today at the last minute, and now the Bruin Nation is weeping!

In a statement released by the school this afternoon, Franco blames his heinous betrayal of his alma mater on some crap scheduling conflicts.

"I deeply regret not being able to keep my commitment to giving the commencement speech at UCLA's graduation this year," Franco said in a prepared statement provided to UCLA. "Unfortunately the date conflicts with me needing to be on location to begin pre-production on my next film. I wish everyone in the 2009 class the best of luck in all of their future endeavors."

Whatever! What a load of BS. We heard that some Fordham kids were throwing a kegger at a house on the Jersey shore next Friday night, and there's no freaking way James Franco is going to miss out on that action. James Franco just bailed on UCLA to get high and laid, just like Bill Clinton did last year.

Meanwhile, the slighted UCLA grads are venting their angst on Twitter, naturally.

See what you're doing James Franco? That's the youth of America speaking right there, and you're destroying them! How will the school ever find someone whose academic and cultural significance is on par with yours on such notice? Who can they possibly find to take their high five-figure speaking fee to step before a podium and spout a bunch of horrible lies cloaked as truth in flowery rhetoric about how they're the future of the nation and how they can change the world and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah? Who will they find to tell them that in five years there's no way they'll ever regret starting out their lives $100,000 in debt for a seemingly worthless piece of paper when they could have been traveling the world having orgies with beautiful strangers and experimenting with mind-altering chemicals? Oh yeah, we almost forgot—- Tom Friedman will cash just about any check!

Whatever, James Franco hates UCLA and he really hates America. This much is certainly true, even though some UCLA students were hoping this would happen.

James Franco not speaking at UCLA commencement ceremony [UCLA Newsroom]