Kevin Spacey plans a comeback if cleared of sexual assault allegations

LONDON — Actor Kevin Spacey has said he plans to make a comeback after the conclusion of his trial over alleged sexual offenses in London, which is expected to begin later this month.

“I know that there are people right now who are ready to hire me the moment I am cleared of these charges in London," Spacey, 63, told German newspaper Die Zeit's ZEITmagazin in an interview published Wednesday. "The second that happens, they’re ready to move forward," he said in the interview, which took place last month and was billed as his first since the scandal.

The two-time Oscar winner is facing a total of 12 sex offense charges relating to events that are alleged to have taken place between 2001 and 2013. A four-week trial is expected to start on June 28, according to British newspaper The Guardian.

The actor pleaded not guilty last July to five of those charges, which featured four counts of sexual assault and one of causing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent. Then, in January he pleaded not guilty again to seven more sex offense charges, denying a number of alleged sexual assaults against one man between 2001 and 2004.

Judge Mark Wall had previously agreed to join the seven-count indictment to an earlier five-count indictment.

In his interview with the German outlet, Spacey spoke of how his life has changed since he was first accused of sexual misconduct by multiple people in 2017 at the start of the #MeToo movement, leading the actor to be dropped from "House of Cards."

Describing that time as "the days when the shit was hitting the fan," Spacey said he was "still processing" that period and was "not ready to talk about it yet."

“It’s a time in which a lot of people are very afraid that if they support me, they will be canceled,” Spacey told ZEITmagazin.

He expressed doubt that he will ever be able to rehabilitate his reputation in the media. And while he said he had started writing, he said he had no plans to write about the allegations against him.

“I’m not trying to even the score,” Spacey said. “I have no interest in fighting something that’s not worth fighting against.”

Spacey said he believed that in "10 years" the allegations against him "won’t mean anything."

"My work will live longer than I will, and that’s what will be remembered," he said.

“The moment scrutiny is applied, these things fall apart,” Spacey told ZEITmagazin, noting how in October, he was found not liable for battery against "Star Trek: Discovery" star Anthony Rapp.

“That’s what happened in the Rapp trial, and that’s what will happen in this case,” he said.

In the early days of the #MeToo movement, Rapp was one of the most prominent people to make sexual misconduct allegations against Spacey.

Rapp had alleged that Spacey climbed on top of him at a party in New York City in 1986, when Rapp was 14 and Spacey was 26. Rapp testified that the alleged encounter was “the most traumatic single event” of his life.

In a statement posted on Twitter following the October verdict, Rapp said he was “deeply grateful for the opportunity to have my case heard before a jury, and I thank the members of the jury for their service.”

“Bringing this lawsuit was always about shining a light, as part of the larger movement to stand up against all forms of sexual violence,” Rapp said, as he vowed to continue advocating for “a world that is free from sexual violence of any kind.”

Spacey’s attorney Jennifer Keller said at the time that she was “very grateful to the jury for seeing through these false allegations."

It was after Rapp's allegations came to light that Spacey came out as a gay man. In a statement after Rapp first publicly detailed his allegations in an article published by BuzzFeed News in October 2017, Spacey said in a tweet that he did not recall the alleged incident but apologized to Rapp for “what would have been deeply inappropriate drunken behavior.” He then came out, writing in part: “I choose now to live as a gay man.”

Before coming out, Spacey said that "part of me was deeply unhappy ... But I wasn’t working on myself. I was avoiding any of that.”

Addressing how he handled his fame, the actor said: “There’s no school you can go to to learn how to handle being famous."

"I think I tried really hard not to be an a**hole. But I think to some degree, I was an a**hole," he said.

The interview with Spacey was held on the day of King Charles III's coronation, ZEITmagazin reported.

The magazine said Spacey had gotten up at 5 a.m. local time that morning to watch the ceremony on television, saying he "played two kings in my life" and "wanted to see what a real coronation looks like.”