Kevin Spacey must pay the company MRC, which produced the series “House of Cards,” nearly $31 million for the alleged inappropriate sexual behavior behind the scenes of the Netflix drama, a judge has ruled, writes Variety.
Spacey, who played Frank Underwood, was kicked off the show after six seasons after facing allegations that he sexually harassed and exploited young men, including a production assistant who said Spacey groped him, triggering the MRC investigation.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mel Red Recana in October 2020 upheld an earlier verdict of about $29.5 million in damages and $1.5 million in costs and fees.
MRC had claimed Spacey owed them millions of lost dollars because his misconduct forced them to pull him from the show’s sixth season and forced them to cut the season from 13 episodes to eight. The arbitrator ruled in favor of the producer, finding that Spacey’s conduct constituted a material breach of his agreements as an actor and executive producer.
Spacey was first accused of misconduct in a 2017 Buzzfeed article in which actor Anthony Rapp claimed Spacey made sexual advances toward him in 1986, when Rapp was 14. Production on “House of Cards” was halted two days later.
CNN later published a report accusing Spacey of creating a “toxic” environment on set by making rude comments and touching young male employees non-consensually.
In May, Spacey was charged with four counts of sexual assault and one count of “inducing a person to engage in sexual activity without consent” by the U.K. Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), which spent more than a year investigating a Metropolitan Police file. The alleged incidents took place between 2005 and 2013 in London and Gloucestershire.
Despite these allegations, Spacey will star in the film “Peter Five Eight.”