Out actor Anthony Rapp said this week
that he hopes he did his part to “change the culture” by speaking
out about Kevin Spacey.
In late 2017, Rapp accused Spacey
(House of Cards) of sexual misconduct when the two actors were
working on Broadway and Rapp was 14. Spacey responded with an
apology of sorts, saying that he did not remember the encounter.
“But if I did behave then as he describes, I owe him the sincerest
apology for what would have been deeply inappropriate drunken
behavior,” Spacey tweeted. Spacey also acknowledged for the first
time publicly that he was gay.
Since Rapp named Spacey (Rapp had
previously discussed the incident), more than a dozen men have
revealed their “me too” stories. Netflix fired Spacey from his
starring role in House of Cards over the allegations.
On the red carpet Thursday for the
second season of Star Trek: Discovery, Rapp, who plays a gay
character on the CBS All Access series, said that he was proud of his
decision to come forward.
“I know that it's something that
needs continued movement forward and I'm going to keep doing my best
to be a part of the movement forward,” Rapp
said.
“I was just concerned that it would
be something that could keep happening, so if I could do something
that could make a difference, I was eager to.”
Wilson Cruz, who plays a love interest
to Rapp's character on Discovery, said that Rapp was being
humble.
“He's being really humble. What he
did was incredibly brave, and he really allowed countless men to be
able to tell their stories. You know, for the most part we were
hearing stories about women and those are important stories to tell.
But there’s a lot of stigma around abused men, sexually abused men
and sexual harassment of men, and it was going to take a brave person
to be able to start that conversation,” Cruz said.