By TOM HAYS and LARRY NEUMEISTER (Associated Press)
NEW YORK (AP) — An emotional Kevin Spacey testified in a New York courtroom Monday that he by no means made a sexual cross on the actor Anthony Rapp, who has sued for tens of millions of {dollars} in damages, claiming the Academy Award-winning actor tried to take him to mattress when he was 14.
Repeatedly, Spacey denied Rapp’s claims {that a} then-26-year-old Spacey picked him up like a groom does a bride after a 1986 social gathering at his Manhattan residence and put him on his mattress earlier than mendacity on high of him.
Rapp testified earlier in a civil trial during which he accuses Spacey of assault and battery that he squirmed out from beneath an inebriated Spacey within the totally clothed encounter earlier than fleeing, solely to have Spacey observe him to the door and ask if he was certain he needed to go away.
“They are not true,” Spacey mentioned of the allegations, first made in 2017 in an interview with Buzzfeed. The accusations, together with extra made by others, delivered to an finish Spacey’s fashionable function on the Netflix sequence “House of Cards” and abruptly derailed his profession.
Spacey, 63, dabbed tears from his eyes with a tissue and sniffled as he described speedy intense stress from publicists and attorneys to reply with compassion and empathy and an apology to Rapp’s claims.
“They told me I couldn’t push back on the story,” Spacey recalled. “I knew I wouldn’t have any sexual interest in Anthony Rapp or any child. That I knew.”
At the time, with the #MeToo motion gaining momentum, “The industry was very nervous. There was a lot of fear in the air about who was going to be next,” he mentioned.
He added: “I was shocked. I was frightened and I was confused. … I knew I had never been alone with Anthony Rapp.”
After the article, the two-time Oscar winner mentioned on Twitter that he didn’t recall the encounter with Rapp, including: ““But if I did behave then as he describes, I owe him the sincerest apology for what would have been deeply inappropriate drunken behavior, and I am sorry for the feelings he describes having carried with him all these years.”
His managers mentioned “it was the best way to contain “a crisis that was going to get worse” and to keep away from being accused of “being a victim shamer,” he mentioned.
Spacey instructed jurors he now regrets “my entire statement.”
“I’ve learned a lesson, which is never apologize for something you didn’t do,” he mentioned.
Spacey mentioned he had met Rapp and one other aspiring actor, John Barrowman, backstage following Spacey’s Broadway efficiency in “Long Day’s Journey into Night.” He mentioned he took them to dinner, to a nightclub and eventually to his studio residence, the place he flirted with Barrowman — who was 19 on the time — however confirmed no real interest in Rapp earlier than the 2 guests left.
“Anthony Rapp seemed like a kid and John Barrowman seemed like a man,” Spacey mentioned in an account that was backed up by a deposition by Barrowman. At the time, Rapp was performing in “Precious Sons” on Broadway.
Rapp, a 50-year-old common on “Star Trek: Discovery” on tv who was a part of the unique Broadway forged of “Rent,” has testified that he and Barrowman went dwelling instantly after the nightclub outing and days later Spacey invited him to his residence social gathering, ready till different company left to make a transfer on him.
The Associated Press doesn’t normally identify folks alleging sexual assault except they arrive ahead publicly, as Rapp has achieved.
Spacey, testifying on a day when Judge Lewis A. Kaplan tossed out Rapp’s declare of intentional infliction of emotional misery on the grounds that it duplicated features of the assault and battery allegation, additionally was requested if he has been personal about his private life over his profession.
“I grew up in a very complicated family dynamic,” he mentioned, explaining that rants by his father when he was a teenager led him to hate bigotry and intolerance.
“My father was a white supremacist and neo-Nazi,” Spacey mentioned. “It meant that my siblings and I were forced to listen to hours and hours of my father lecturing us about his beliefs.”
As Spacey grew to become interested by theater, he mentioned, he endured the screams of his father who “used to yell at me at the idea that I might be gay.”
Prior to Monday’s testimony, Spacey mentioned he had “never talked about these things publicly, ever.”
He mentioned he had been contemplating revealing that he was homosexual publicly for about 18 months earlier than deciding to announce it after Rapp’s allegations got here out.
Spacey cried as he described instantly regretting the timing of the revelation as he confronted backlash within the homosexual neighborhood, together with from pals, and others who thought he was utilizing the announcement to alter the topic, to deflect.
“It was really wrong and it was really bad and I’m deeply sorry,” he mentioned as his voice cracked.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”