Ridley Scott did not speak to disgraced actor Kevin Spacey before deciding to edit him out of his new film All The Money In The World.
The filmmaker finished shooting the biographical drama over the summer (17), with Spacey portraying oil tycoon Jean Paul Getty.
Last month (Oct17), Rent actor Anthony Rapp accused the star of making a sexual advance towards him when he was just 14, prompting other alleged victims to come forward.
After hearing the allegations, Scott decided to scrap scenes featuring Spacey and reshoot them with Christopher Plummer in the role, and has now revealed that he didn’t speak with the 58-year-old before making his decision.
“No. And he didn’t call me,” the director said in an interview Entertainment Weekly, when asked if he had spoken to Spacey. “If he had called me and said, ‘Hey, look, this is the way it is and I’m really sorry.’ Then I’d have handled it slightly differently.”
Although he would have liked to have spoken to Spacey before announcing he was editing the actor out of his movie, he explained that he wouldn’t have acted differently had they spoken.
Scott was in London’s famous Abbey Road studio finalizing the film’s score when he heard the allegations against the actor.
“Someone was like: ‘Guess what?’ And that’s where it began,” he explained. “I sat and thought about it and realized, we cannot. You can’t tolerate any kind of behaviour like that. And it will affect the film. We cannot let one person’s action affect the good work of all these other people. It’s that simple.”
Despite his anger at Spacey’s alleged behavior, Scott said they “got on very well” on set. All the Money in the World is still scheduled for release next month (Dec17), despite the reshoots, with the first trailer featuring Plummer premiering on Wednesday.
Spacey, who came out as gay in response to Rapp’s allegations, is also facing a U.K. police investigation.
Bosses at London’s Old Vic theater, where he was artistic director for a decade, have received complaints about the star’s behavior from 20 individuals.
