Kevin Spacey will no longer be featured as an acting instructor for MasterClass, a website selling celebrity-recorded video courses in facets of the entertainment industry from screenwriting to directing, Variety reported Tuesday.
“In light of recent events, MasterClass has closed enrollment in Kevin Spacey’s online class,” MasterClass said in a statement, according to the Hollywood trade magazine.
Mr. Spacey had been affiliated with MasterClass since February 2016, and his online course ran about five hours in length over 28 lessons, Variety said. Clients also enjoyed the opportunity to send Mr. Spacey video recording of their performances to solicit his feedback.
Meanwhile another MasterClass acting instructor, Dustin Hoffman, is now also under fresh scrutiny with a newly surfaced allegation of sexual harassment from the mid 1980s.
In a guest column for The Hollywood Reporter (THR) published Wednesday, writer Anna Graham Hunter claims that Hoffman’s inappropriate behavior came in 1985, when she was just 17 and an assistant on the set of “Death of a Salesman.”
“He was openly flirtatious, he grabbed my ass, he talked about sex to me and in front of me,” Ms. Hunter wrote. “One morning I went to his dressing room to take his breakfast order; he looked at me and grinned, taking his time. Then he said, ’I’ll have a hard-boiled egg … and a soft-boiled clitoris.’ His entourage burst out laughing. I left, speechless. Then I went to the bathroom and cried.”
In a statement sent Wednesday to THR, Mr. Hoffman apologized for his behavior while insisting his actions were out of character for him.
“I have the utmost respect for women and feel terrible that anything I might have done could have put her in an uncomfortable situation. I am sorry. It is not reflective of who I am,” Mr. Hoffman said.
• Ken Shepherd can be reached at kshepherd@washingtontimes.com.
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