One of the people that’s been hardest hit by the #MeToo movement is Kevin Spacey. After multiple allegations of sexual assault from various men, Spacey was removed as the star of one of Netflix’s biggest series, “House of Cards.” Spacey was also famously cut from the Oscar-nominated film “All the Money in the World,” where the cast and crew went back for 10 days of filming with actor Christopher Plummer to redo every one of Spacey’s scenes. For all intents and purposes, Kevin Spacey’s acting career seems to be history, for now.
However, that’s not completely accurate. You see, there’s a new film coming out this summer starring the disgraced actor, but you’d be hard-pressed to find any footage or marketing for the film online. “Billionaire Boys Club” is based on a true story of a group of young men who hit it big on the back of a Ponzi scheme. The film stars Taron Egerton, Ansel Elgort, and the aforementioned Spacey. It was filmed in 2015 and 2016, well before the allegations surfaced, and the production company has released a statement explaining why they’re still moving forward with the film.
“We hope these distressing allegations pertaining to one person’s behavior — that were not publicly known when the film was made almost 2.5 years ago — do not tarnish the release,” a statement from Vertical Entertainment said (via The Wrap).
“We don’t condone sexual harassment on any level and we fully support victims of it. At the same time, this is neither an easy nor insensitive decision to release this film in theaters, but we believe in giving the cast, as well as hundreds of crew members who worked hard on the film, the chance to see their final product reach audiences,” the statement continued. “In the end, we hope audiences make up their own minds as to the reprehensible allegations of one person’s past, but not at the expense of the entire cast and crew present on this film.”
As mentioned above, it doesn’t appear that the distributor plans on pushing the film much in the US, however overseas, there’s been a trailer released (watch below). Judging by the trailer, it’s obvious that the project was originally conceived as being a “Wolf of Wall Street”-esque film with some fairly big name acting talent. But alas, the film is getting buried in the US with little fanfare.
If you’re interested in watching the film, “Billionaire Boys Club” will hit VOD on July 17 and limited theaters on August 17.