Kevin Spacey says a new documentary featuring previously unseen interviews about his conduct is a one-sided and desperate enterprise that has not given him adequate time to respond.
The documentary, set to air next week in the U.K. on Channel 4, has been in the works since 2022. Since that time, Spacey has been acquitted of multiple sexual assault charges. Though he has been accused in news media reports and in several legal venues of sexual misconduct, he has never been criminally convicted or found liable in a civil court proceeding.
Spacey wrote on X Thursday: “Over the last week, I have repeatedly requested that @Channel4 afford me more than 7 days to respond to allegations made against me dating back 48 years and provide me with sufficient details to investigate these matters. Channel 4 has refused on the basis that they feel that asking for a response in 7 days to new, anonymized and non-specific allegations is a ‘fair opportunity’ for me to refute any allegations made against me.
“I will not sit back and be attacked by a dying network’s one-sided ‘documentary’ about me in their desperate attempt for ratings. There’s a proper channel to handle allegations against me and it’s not Channel 4. Each time I have been given the time and a proper forum to defend myself, the allegations have failed under scrutiny and I have been exonerated.”
He also said he would respond on his X account this weekend.
Details on the Kevin Spacey Documentary Spacey Unmasked
The two-part documentary is expected to air in the U.S. via Warner Discovery. Variety shared a statement from the production last week describing it as “a forensic look at a man who was once one of the most admired and respected actors in the world. Featuring never-seen-before interviews and archive, the series examines his life from childhood to early success on Broadway and subsequent meteoric rise to stardom. Kevin Spacey’s spectacular fall from grace came amid allegations of inappropriate sexual behavior.”
The production added: “In 2023 Spacey was acquitted of sexual offenses against four men in a U.K. trial. This two-part series will investigate Spacey’s conduct and talks to multiple men unconnected to that case about their experiences with Kevin Spacey, almost all of whom have never spoken before.”
Roast Beef Productions, the production company behind Spacey Unmasked, did not immediately respond to a request for comment from MovieMaker.
Spacey was found not guilty in a London court last summer on nine charges of sexual assault, indecent assault and causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity.
Spacey previously won a $40 million civil lawsuit brought by actor Anthony Rapp in October 2022. Rapp had accused Spacey of sexual battery, which took place in 1986, when he was 14, but a New York jury dismissed the claim.
Rapp first accused Spacey in a 2017 BuzzFeed article. Spacey’s roles quickly began to disappear: He was cut from his Netflix series, House of Cards, and hastily replaced in the film All the Money in the World by Christopher Plummer.
Spacey has subsequently released several videos in character as his House of Cards character, Frank Underwood, as he attempted to rehabilitate his public image.
On November 3, 2022, Variety reported that Spacey was set to speak at the National Museum of Cinema and was going to receive a lifetime achievement award on January 16, 2023, despite the allegations against him.[85] On November 28, 2022, after winning a sexual battery lawsuit against him filed by Anthony Rapp, Spacey was cast in the British indie thriller Control. Its director, Gene Fallaize, dismissed concerns about working with Spacey.[86]
In 2022, he was cast in the British indie thriller Control, by director Gene Fallaize, and as the late Croatian leader Franjo Tuđman in the film Once Upon a Time in Croatia, directed by Jakov Sedlar.
Main image: Kevin Spacey in a video he released on social media.
Share: