Kevin Spacey finished testifying on Tuesday in the $40 million sexual misconduct lawsuit brought against the “House of Cards” star by Anthony Rapp. The Oscar-winning actor was cross-examined by Rapp’s attorney Richard Steigman, and remained calm, smirking at points, as he was grilled about his drug use and memories of encountering Rapp in 1986 when they were both appearing in stage productions. Rapp was 14 and starring in “Precious Sons”; Spacey was on Broadway in the Jack Lemmon-led revival of “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.”
The conversation was meandering — Spacey continued to deny Rapp’s claims that he tried to seduce the then-teenager — and at one point even touched upon a key sequence in “American Beauty” in which Spacey’s character Lester Burnham masturbates to an image of his daughter’s best friend bedecked with rose petals while lying in an oversized tub.
“It was a fantasy scene,” Spacey clarified. After Steigman emphasized that Burnham masturbates in two different sequences, Spacey replied that “he was a little frustrated, so…”
Judge Lewis A. Kaplan quickly cut off that line of questioning. Spacey clarified that in addition to using marijuana in the 1980s as he had previously testified, he had also used cocaine. He also said that he misspoke when he described having drinks with Rapp, the actor John Barrowman, and Lemmon backstage at “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.” Lemmon, he noted, had given up drinking alcohol by that point in his life. Barrowman, an actor best known for his work in “Doctor Who,” is a key witness who spent a critical evening in 1986 at the Limelight nightclub with both Spacey and Rapp.
Steigman grew frustrated at points during the day, particularly after Judge Kaplan denied his request to introduce testimony from another Spacey accuser to jurors, who was 16 years old at the time of the alleged incident in 1988. He grilled Kaplan about why he wouldn’t allow Rapp’s team to mention other legal issues that Spacey is facing surrounding sexual misconduct in the United Kingdom, as well the $31 million in damages that the actor has been ordered to pay “House of Cards” producer MRC for allegedly engaging in sexually predatory behavior during that show’s production.
“This is argumentative,” Judge Kaplan told Steigman at one point. “Let’s move on.”
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