Spacey, who has been guarded about his private life, for the first time also acknowledged he is gay.
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"As those closest to me know, in my life I have had relationships with both men and women," Spacey said in a statement released via Twitter. "I have loved and had romantic encounters with men throughout my life, and I choose now to live as a gay man."
The statements came as actor Anthony Rapp said when he was 14 in 1986, Spacey invited him to his apartment for a party and made aggressive sexual advances toward him.
Rapp disclosed the encounter to Buzzfeed News in light of the growing Hollywood sexual harassment scandal that started with Harvey Weinstein but has also enveloped other industry figures.
He said Spacey, then an unknown 26-year-old actor on Broadway, invited him over to his apartment for a party and at the end of the night, physically picked him up and put him on a bed and climbed on top of him making a sexual advance.
Rapp said he was able to squirm away before the encounter went any further, but the memories have haunted him for years.
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Spacey initially did not respond to the allegations until releasing the statement on Twitter.
"I have a lot of respect and admiration for Anthony Rapp as an actor. I'm beyond horrified to hear his story," Spacey wrote.
"I honestly do not remember the encounter, as it would have been over 30 years ago. But if I did behave then as he describes, I owe him the sincerest apology for what would have been deeply inappropriate drunken behavior, and I am sorry for the feelings he describes having carried with him all these years."