He is an actor and director born Kevin Spacey Fowler in South Orange, New Jersey. His father was a technical writer and his mother a secretary. His father was often without work and alleged to have been part of the American Nazi Party by Fox News, so they moved around a lot until they finally settled in Southern California.
Often in trouble, he was sent to Northridge Military Academy for setting his sister’s treehouse on fire but had to leave there when he had thrown a tyre at another student. He began performing on stage at his high school where a classmate was Val Kilmer. In his 12th grade production of The Sound of Music he played Georg von Trapp, and after he had decided he wanted to become an actor he took his mother’s maiden name of Spacey. During and prior to him studying at the Juilliard School in New York he performed as a stand-up comedian, often at talent contests.
His professional stage debut was in 1981 in the New York Shakespeare Festival where he played a messenger in Henry VI, Part I and the following year his Broadway debut was in Ibsen’s Ghosts. He moved between theatre, TV and film with his first TV appearance being in Crime Story and his film debut in the made-for-TV The Murder of Mary Phagan. His other TV appearances have been in the series L.A. Law and Wiseguy.
His successful film career has seen him appearing in films such as Superman Returns, Swimming with Sharks, and Se7en, winning Academy Awards for Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor in American Pie and The Usual Suspects and directing movies such as Albino Alligator and Beyond the Sea, for which he was nominated for a Golden Globe for his performance.
In theatre he has won a Tony Award for Lost in Yonkers and he worked with Dame Judi Dench at the Old Vic Theatre in London on the fundraiser for victims of 9/11. He returned to the Old Vic in 2003 as artistic director and also stars in two shows a season. It is his intention to stay there for the next 9 years and claim dual British citizenship.
London South Bank University awarded him an honorary doctorate in 2005.
In the 2010s he won a Golden Globe for his role in the series House of Cards.
From 2017 he has been dealing with various accusations of sexual conduct and ensuing lawsuits and investigations.
Kevin Spacey Recordings
Once Upon a Time (Lee Adams/Charles Strouse)
Sources: