Kevin Spacey accuser Anthony Rapp claimed in court Friday he was frozen as he was pinned underneath the “House of Cards” actor during an alleged sexual assault when Rapp was only 14 years old.
“I was frozen. I was pinned underneath him. I felt like a deer in headlights, I didn’t really know what to do,” Rapp recalled as he took the stand to testify in his civil lawsuit against Spacey.
Rapp, a “Rent” on Broadway star, had some experience acting at age 14 and says he used to hang out with people in the industry. He had previously met Spacey, then 26 years old, who invited him for a party at his Upper East Side apartment in New York City in 1986.
Rapp didn’t know anyone else at the party and recalled feeling “immediately awkward and shy.” So, he just went into a bedroom and watched some television.
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Kevin Spacey is accused of sexually assaulting Anthony Rapp when Rapp was 14 years old.
(Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images)
On the stand, Rapp, who was wearing a navy suit and tie, sounded solemn as he then described seeing Spacey “glassy-eyed” and looking “intoxicated” as he approached the boy. By that time, it seemed like everyone was gone, Rapp recalled. Without saying a word, Spacey reached down and picked the boy up, Rapp alleges.
“Holding me then like a groom holds a bride over a threshold,” he testified while gesturing and adding that he was feeling “very confused” at that moment.
Spacey reportedly laid the boy down on the bed and “climbed on top of (him),” Rapp alleged. “He put his full weight onto my chest. … His groin was pressing into like, the side of my hip.”
Asked by his attorney Peter Saghir, why the 14-year-old didn’t tell Spacey to stop or do something, Rapp said he “doesn’t know.” But he did eventually manage to escape.
“I squirmed my way off from underneath him,” said Rapp, who then left Spacey’s apartment.
Kevin Spacey
(Marta Dhanis)
“It was an incredibly frightening and very alarming and totally antithetical to anything else that I had experienced around the community of people that I loved being a part of,” Rapp recalls of his days as a teen actor.
Throughout his testimony, Rapp and Spacey were in the line of sight of one another, but there was no visible reaction from Spacey. The “American Beauty” star, who wore a dark suit, red tie and light blue shirt, was leaning over the defense table and paying close attention to what was said.
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Rapp is suing Spacey for unspecified damages. When the allegation first surfaced in 2017, Spacey said he didn’t remember the encounter but offered an apology to the fellow actor. Later, when Rapp’s lawsuit was filed, Spacey denied Rapp’s claims.
Anthony Rapp is suing Kevin Spacey for unspecified damages. Spacey denies all of Rapp’s claims.
(Sylvain Lefevre/WireImage)
Earlier on Friday, a witness told the jurors that the actor sexually assaulted him in his office space at the Public Theater in New York City in 1981, never saying a word to him.
Andrew Holtzman, who was 27 at the time, was running a film program at the theater, where he had an office space with an empty desk that was regularly used by other people. Holtzman testified that, one day that summer, while he was on the phone, Spacey, who then had a small part in a “Henry the IV” play and was still an “unknown actor,” entered his office and sat on the empty desk, staring at him and saying “nothing at all.”
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Holtzman recognized him from his work at the theater and got off the phone.
“I noticed he was wearing very tight blue jeans and, through the blue jeans, was a very clear large erection,” Holtzman alleged. That’s when the witness alleges Spacey walked toward him, “lifted me up by my crotch,” pushed him against his desk and got on top of him.
Holtzman says he remembers “screaming things” like “What are you doing? Get off of me.”
“I could feel his erection on my body … near my groin,” the witness claimed. He says Spacey then “relented and got off of me.” Holtzman recalled Spacey was “very angry” and “stormed out of the office, slamming the door.” According to Holtzman, Spacey never uttered a single word, and there were no other interactions between the two.
Spacey seemed bothered by the testimony. His face appeared to turn red as Holtzman spoke. Spacey took notes at times while seated at the defense table and listening closely to the witness.
Although Holtzman is not a party in the case, he serves as a witness for the plaintiff to try to prove a pattern of sexual assault by the defendant.
Spacey seemed bothered by Andrew Holtzman’s testimony. He took notes at times while seated at the defense table, listening closely to the witness.
(Alexi J. Rosenfeld/Getty Images)
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While this is a dispute in civil court, the “House of Cards” and “American Beauty” star has yet to face a criminal trial next year in London.
Rapp will return to the witness stand when the trial resumes Tuesday.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
