Kevin Spacey to receive award in Italy amid sex assault legal battles

Actor Kevin Spacey was in the northern Italian city of Turin on Monday to receive a lifetime achievement award, teach a master class and introduce a screening of the 1999 film. American Beauty.

The sold-out event was billed as Spacey’s first engagement since the #MeToo-era allegations tarnished his burgeoning career. The two-time Academy Award winner lost the lead role in the Netflix series House of Cards and saw other opportunities dry up.

Spacey is working on his latest film, directed by Franco Nero The Man Who Draws God, in Turin. He will receive an award for contributing to the growth of cinema and be interviewed about his career at the National Museum of Cinema in the city.

Previous winners of the Stella della Mole Award include actors Isabella Rossellini and Monica Bellucci, and director Dario Argento.

Scheduled for attempted sexual assault

Spacey is scheduled to stand trial in London in June on dozens of charges that he assaulted four men between 2001 and 2013, including when he was artistic director of the city’s Old Vic theatre. He has pleaded not guilty.

In October, a federal jury in a New York civil case found that Spacey, 63, did not sexually abuse actor Anthony Rapp when they were both unidentified Broadway actors in 1986 and Rapp was 14 years old. The jury deliberated for more than an hour before deciding that Rapp, now 50, had not proven the charges.

Spacey previously faced allegations in Massachusetts that he groped a man in a bar. Prosecutors later dropped the charges.

A judge in Los Angeles in August upheld an arbitrator’s decision to order Spacey to pay $30.9 million to producers. House of Cards for breach of contract with sexual harassment crew members.