A professor who claims he was fired from his job at New York University after giving James Franco a "D" is to sue his former student for defamation.

José Angel Santana, who is already engaged in legal action against his former employer, has now filed a civil action in the Manhattan supreme court over comments Franco made labelling his classes "awful". He says he handed out the low grade because the 127 Hours star attended just two out of his 14 scheduled directing classes.

"Whoever was in Clint Eastwood's chair at the Republican national convention was more present than Mr Franco was in my classes," Santana told the New York Post. "[Franco] uses the bully pulpit of his celebrity to punish anyone who doesn't do his bidding."

The offending comments were made during interviews for Franco's film The Broken Tower in April. He told reporters Santana was "awful," adding: "I didn't feel like I needed to waste my time with a bad teacher."

"No teacher will ever be fired from NYU for giving a student a D," added the actor. "He wasn't fired, he was asked not to come back after three years because they didn't think he was a good teacher. He is not going to be hired at another institution."

But Santana, who has been been a teacher since 1979 and was earning $70,000 (£44,000) prior to being let go by the university, said he had "overwhelmingly positive student evaluations". He said: "I didn't deserve to be on the receiving end of those falsehoods. I was outraged that someone with his attendance record at NYU had the audacity to make those statements."

Santana, who taught as an assistant arts professor on the actor's graduate film course, also said he was simply doing his job by handing Franco a low grade, in contrast with other professors, who "bent over backwards to create a Franco-friendly environment".

The teacher filed a lawsuit against New York University in December 2011 in protest at his dismissal, claiming that Franco received good grades from his former colleagues despite similar levels of absence from their lectures. These, Santana alleged, were in return for the publicity the actor's enrolment brought the school and because the actor had collaborated with faculty members on independent film projects.