Kevin Spacey

Kevin Spacey (born July 26, 1959, South Orange, New Jersey, U.S.) is an American actor on stage and screen, especially known for his dynamic roles in dark comedies.

Early life and career

When Spacey was a young boy, his family moved frequently, ultimately settling in southern California. In high school he began taking drama classes and subsequently appeared in numerous school productions. He also displayed his impersonation talent in comedy club performances. Following graduation he attended Los Angeles Valley College, but in 1979 he moved to New York City and enrolled in the Juilliard School. After two years Spacey moved on and soon made his professional debut in Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part I. In 1982 he appeared in his first Broadway production, Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts. Notable stage roles in Hurlyburly (1985) and Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night (1986) followed, as did appearances in the films Heartburn (1986) and Working Girl (1988).

Se7en, L.A. Confidential, and American Beauty

In 1991 Spacey won a Tony Award for featured actor for his performance as the mobster Uncle Louie in Neil Simon’s hit Lost in Yonkers. Following his theatrical success, he earned praise for his work in such films as Glengarry Glen Ross (1992), Swimming with Sharks (1994), and Se7en (1995). His performance in The Usual Suspects (1995) as a double-talking con man earned him an Academy Award for best supporting actor. After appearing in the well-received crime drama L.A. Confidential (1997), Spacey returned to the stage in 1998 and received the Evening Standard, London Theatre Critics’ Circle, and Laurence Olivier best actor awards for his portrayal of Hickey in O’Neill’s The Iceman Cometh. In 1999 he starred as a frustrated husband and father in the dark comedy American Beauty. His ability to show the alienation and vulnerability of his character, Lester Burnham—a middle-class family man obsessed with a beautiful classmate of his teenage daughter—brought Spacey enthusiastic critical acclaim, and he won an Academy Award for best actor.

Discover the fascinating events that shaped the world, straight from our editors.

SIGN UP

By clicking “Sign Up”, you consent to the Britannica Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.

Britannica Quiz

Oscar-Worthy Movie Trivia

Later credits and House of Cards

Spacey maintained a busy acting schedule in the early 21st century. He starred opposite Helen Hunt and Haley Joel Osment in Pay It Forward (2000) and appeared as a newspaper reporter in The Shipping News (2001), a film adaptation of E. Annie Proulx’s award-winning novel. In 2003 Spacey was appointed artistic director of the Old Vic in London. He was the first American to serve as director of that British theater company, and he also acted in several of its productions, including Shakespeare’s Richard II (in 2005) and Richard III (in 2011). In 2006 he appeared in his third O’Neill play, A Moon for the Misbegotten, and he continued in the production when it transferred to Broadway the following year. In 2015 Spacey received a special Olivier Award and later that year stepped down as artistic director at the Old Vic.

In 2004 Spacey directed and starred in the film Beyond the Sea, a biopic about pop music legend Bobby Darin. In 2008 he portrayed Mickey Rosa, an MIT professor who teaches his students to count cards, in the thriller 21. After playing a political operative in the HBO television movie Recount (2008), a drama set in the aftermath of the 2000 U.S. presidential election, Spacey appeared in the feature film The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009), a comedy about U.S. soldiers trained to use psychic powers. In 2010 he portrayed real-life political lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who was convicted for his role in a corruption scandal, in the dark comedy Casino Jack, and he starred as a disgraced television huckster in Father of Invention.

Spacey later took on the role of a sadistic office supervisor in another dark comedy, Horrible Bosses (2011) and its 2014 sequel. He appeared as an investment bank executive in the thriller Margin Call (2011), which was set during the early stages of the 2008 financial crisis. In 2016 Spacey starred as U.S. Pres. Richard Nixon in Elvis & Nixon, about a 1970 encounter between the president and musician Elvis Presley (Michael Shannon). In the family comedy Nine Lives (2016), his character, a successful businessman, is turned into a cat. Spacey’s film credits from 2017 included the action comedy Baby Driver, in which he played a crime boss.

In 2013 Spacey began a starring role as a cutthroat U.S. congressman from South Carolina in the political drama House of Cards, an episodic series created for Netflix and distributed via the company’s online streaming-video service. Later seasons saw his character, Frank Underwood, become vice president and then president. The role earned him a Golden Globe Award for best actor in a drama series in 2015.

Explore Britannica Premium!

The trusted destination for professionals, college students, and lifelong learners.

SUBSCRIBE

Sexual assault allegations

In 2017, after being accused of attempted sexual assault of a 14-year-old male actor in 1986, Spacey issued an apology and was promptly criticized for using the situation to come out as gay. As additional allegations of sexual misconduct emerged, Spacey’s spokesperson announced that the actor was seeking evaluation and treatment. Amid the uproar, Netflix publicized a forthcoming end of House of Cards and later announced that it had severed ties with Spacey, effectively removing him from the show. The streaming service also halted production of the upcoming movie Gore, which starred Spacey. In addition, his scenes in Ridley Scott’s All the Money in the World (2017) were cut and reshot with Christopher Plummer replacing him as oil tycoon J. Paul Getty. Billionaire Boys Club, one of the last movies Spacey filmed before the scandal broke, was released in 2018. That year authorities announced that Spacey would be charged with indecent assault and battery for allegedly groping an 18-year-old busboy at a Nantucket, Massachusetts, bar in 2016. In January 2019 a plea of not guilty was entered on Spacey’s behalf. However, in July the charges were dismissed “due to the unavailability of the complaining witness” after the alleged victim invoked the Fifth Amendment during a pretrial hearing concerning his missing cell phone.

During this time several men accused Spacey of sexual misconduct while he was artistic director of the Old Vic. In 2022 British authorities charged him with four counts of sexual assault and one count of causing a person to engage in penetrative sexual activity without consent. Spacey denied the allegations.

Spacey was named honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in 2010 and honorary Knight Commander (KBE) in 2015.