Kevin Spacey (House of Cards) will have to pay 31 million dollars to the production company of the series: the actor accused of sexual harassment
Sylvie Claire / August 5, 2022
Actor Kevin Spacey will have to pay nearly $31 million to the production company of the series House of Cards, from which he was fired following accusations of sexual harassment, a judge ruled Thursday, rejecting his appeal. The actor, who won two Oscars for American Beauty and Usual Suspects, is also being sued in the UK for four sexual assaults on three men.
In 2017, Kevin Spacey had been the subject of a wave of accusations of sexual harassment and assault, which had put an abrupt end to his career, in the wake of the #MeToo movement and the Harvey Weinstein case. MRC, the production company behind House of Cards, about political intrigue in Washington, was seeking damages for lost revenue attributed to the actor's dismissal from the series. This had forced the company to rework the sixth season in depth.
In 2020, an arbitration had concluded that Kevin Spacey had to compensate the losses and costs related to these changes. But his lawyers had claimed that the arbitrator had exceeded his prerogatives by taking into account certain evidence.
On Thursday, however, Judge Mel Red Recana confirmed that the fallen Hollywood icon would have to pay nearly $31 million for damages and court costs. The judge recalled that, according to the arbitration findings, Kevin Spacey had violated the terms of his contract due to his alleged behavior.
Kevin Spacey has always denied sexually harassing anyone.
In House of Cards, the actor played the unscrupulous politician Frank Underwood. In mid-July, he pleaded not guilty in London to sexual assaults committed between March 2005 and April 2013.
In the United States, Kevin Spacey was charged with indecent assault and sexual assault in the state of Massachusetts, on the East Coast. He was accused of having, in July 2016, put his hands on the sex of a young man of 18 years employed in a bar, after having made him drink. But the charges had been dropped in July 2019.