Kevin Spacey says his Hollywood comeback is finally taking shape, telling Bill Maher on the Club Random podcast on Monday, 29 June 2026, that he feels “much more welcomed” nine years after misconduct allegations upended his career.
The actor, 66, was once one of the most decorated names in the industry before a wave of allegations from 2017 onward saw him dropped from House of Cards and frozen out of major projects, as reported by Variety.
He has since been acquitted or found not liable in a series of criminal and civil cases.
What Kevin Spacey told Bill Maher
Spacey said he feels “less in jail” now than in recent years and that momentum is building.
“I feel much more welcomed, and I think that things are moving in the direction that we hoped they were moving in,” he told Maher.
He pointed to his courtroom record, noting he had won “in every court we’ve gone into with a jury”.
His framing throughout the conversation was that the tide has turned. He cast the past few years as a period of exile that is now lifting, presenting each court outcome as evidence that the public narrative around him was wrong.
The “less in jail” line summed up his mood.
Where Bill Maher pushed back
Maher was sympathetic but did not let the claims pass unchallenged, telling Spacey he believed some of the accusations had merit.
“There’s too much smoke to be no fire,” Maher said.
Spacey conceded that his past behaviour had crossed a line, adding that “it just wasn’t a raging forest fire”.
The exchange captured the split that still surrounds Spacey. Legal acquittals sit alongside a public memory of the allegations, and Maher’s “smoke” comment reflected a view many in the industry still hold even after the verdicts.
Spacey’s reply tried to acknowledge fault without conceding the most serious claims.
How far Kevin Spacey fell
The fall was steep. Spacey held two Academy Awards and a hit Netflix series when the first claims emerged in 2017, and within weeks he had been written out of House of Cards and replaced in a finished film, an almost unheard-of move at that stage of production.
What happens next for Kevin Spacey
Spacey’s legal wins have cleared the path for a return, but acceptance from studios, streamers and audiences is a separate question.
Whether the welcome he describes translates into a high-profile lead role, rather than independent films and festival appearances, will be the real test of how far his comeback can go.
For now, Spacey is doing the work of rehabilitation in public, using podcasts and interviews to reset his image one appearance at a time. The next confirmed casting announcement will say more about his prospects than any quote can.
