An alleged victim of Kevin Spacey told on Tuesday how the American actor told him to be “cool” by trying to kiss him and touch his penis during his trial in London. The 63-year-old actor, on trial last week, pleaded not guilty in January to 12 charges of sexually assaulting four men between 2001 and 2013, including from 2004 when he was manager of London’s Old Vic theatre.
The victim, who cannot be identified for legal reasons, said in a police interview aired at trial on Tuesday that he had met Kevin Spacey in a pub in the Cotswolds region (south-west of England) in 2013, where the actor joined his group of friends, before offering them “to continue the party” with alcohol and joints in the property where he lived.
The victim had gone there with others, and had inadvertently let the actor’s dog out. He explained that he apologized to Kevin Spacey, who then hugged him and told him not to worry. “He hugged me, I gave him a kind of pat on the back. At that point he kissed me twice on the neck, and grabbed my crotch. He told me twice be cool, be cool. I put my arm between us, and pushed him against a wall. “I said to him, sorry man, I don’t play in this yard,” the alleged victim said of his “shock.”
According to him, the Hollywood star then had a “panicked look” and left the room without saying anything. The trial started last week at Southwark Crown Court. Kevin Spacey, who appears free, denied these accusations, believing that some were invented and that other acts were consented. He was described by prosecutor Christine Agnew as a “sexual harasser” who “does not respect boundaries or personal space” and “likes to make others (…) uncomfortable”. The trial of the American actor, twice Oscar winner for his roles in American Beauty and Usual Suspects should last a month.