The case with LCK stands interesting comparison to Kevin Spacey (also yet to be convicted of any crime, and accused of non violent sexual assaults, although if we are splitting hairs, I’d agree they’re a bit more sinister). Like CK, Spacey’s crimes were an open secret in certain circles, and part of the wrongness in both cases is embedded in an industry that didn’t hold these powerful men to account on behalf of the most vulnerable among them.
There are two differences though. Spacey was a man at the absolute pinnacle of his profession, commanding Hollywood, the Golden Age of TV drama AND having turned around the artistic and commercial status of The Old Vic, earning many calls for an honourary knighthood... and I don’t think he will ever work again. There’s no feeling that he’s due a rehabilitation. He filmed-but-not-released work was either re-shot or abandoned. The star of The Usual Suspects, American Beauty and LA Confidential is over and out.
Louis CK was highly successful, though not as mainstream-famous outside America. Nevertheless he was immensely powerful and undoubtedly rich enough to retire from performance (and perhaps command huge sums as a top tier comedy writer, if his greed for the millionaire lifestyle was too strong). But he’s made it clear that he feels entitled to continue taking up limited space in the very industry his victims are also working to succeed in. In fact his recent work suggests that he’s planning to capitalise on the harm he did to others, by creating work that will better appeal to the alt-right shit-stains that think “the feminazis done him wrong”.
The other difference is the type of artist these men are. While Spacey was an actor, LCK is a stand up comedian whose work is at some level a communication of himself, his thoughts and feelings. I used to have enormous respect for Kevin Spacey. He might’ve been the finest American actor of his generation. You might say I had him on a pedestal. Yet despite never being himself on screen, I would never want to sit and watch a new Kevin Spacey film. It’s taking a while for me to want to watch his old ones. I have no idea how you can still enjoy and want to watch new work from CK, knowing what he did - because CK’s work is all about him. The sexually exploitative man who repeatedly abused his professional power to use those less powerful as a prop for his sexual gratification. If you know the bloke’s personality is dogshit, and you know all his new work is created from a position in which he knows that everyone in the audience knows he’s a cunt to women and don’t care... how can you support him? How can this new, real version of him, still be on your pedestal?
