Well he looks. Recovered. Tidied up somehow. Kevin Spacey moves with a confident gesture in front of the camera, speaking with a sonorous, warm voice. Facial expressions and body language perfectly support his verbal messages, hints, and appeals. He seeks eye contact with his audience, builds emotional bridges, flatters. It's like a conversation among peers, among cronies, among accomplices. The video impressively underlines why Kevin Spacey can be missed: the man is an actor in a class of his own.

And he is neither pale nor emaciated since he became unemployed in October 2017. Oh well, unemployed: He became a pariah, which was talked about a lot, but not with him. He lost his jobs, cut him out of his last films. His agents and the studios distanced themselves from him. From the courted Academy Award winner was a shy.

When actor Anthony Rapp announced in October 2017 that he was sexually assaulted by Spacey at the age of 14, Spacey did not fundamentally deny that. He could not remember, he said, but if Rapp felt that way then he apologized. He will go into therapy because of his problems.

Rapp is 47 today, and whatever happened back then or not, it's probably barred. This is true of many of the offenses and crimes that were gradually accused of Spacey in the 2017 Tartar Autumn. The damage to the image of the actor was disastrous, but it may be that he still believed that he would get away with it. A few months after the first allegations, one counted 16 possible victims. The allegations range from exhibitionist irritations to the rape of minors.

These are not trivial offenses. But until a court adjudicates, it is initially "only" allegations. Kevin Spacey is now using this for trying to rehabilitate himself. That this video message was published on the same day as the announcement that he will be shown to the magistrate on January 7 to stand trial in Massachusetts may or may not be a coincidence.

You do not have to be a good person to be a good actor

Because it takes time to produce something like that. Did Spacey prepare it for the case of an indictment? Or as an attempt to start his comeback? Eventually, director Paul Schrader had come up with an appeal to reoccupy Spacey at the end of November: "Yesterday I got a very good script that screamed for Kevin Spacey in the lead role."

Schrader wrote on Facebook that his producers rejected that, he thought was wrong. He distinguishes between the crimes of the person and their value as an artist: "To punish him as an artist only reduces art."

In this argument, the belief resonates that the end justifies the means. Spacey moves in his on the one hand quite professionally produced, on the other hand quite disturbing video exactly on this line. "I know what you want," he whispers to the audience. "They tried to separate us, but what unites us is too strong, too powerful, but in the end we shared everything: I showed you my deepest, darkest secrets, I showed you what people are capable of, me have you shocked with my honesty. "

No, not really: Spacey shocked his fans with the things he secretly did. But it's not Kevin Spacey who speaks, but Frank Underwood, his most famous role: the intriguing political strategist who assassins himself in the White House. Spacey shows what Schrader may have meant: he, the gifted artist, can be convincingly different in front of the camera. One who shocked us in a pleasant way, who repeatedly made us complicit in violation of the "Fourth Wall", simply addressing the viewer from the action.

Innocent - or unable to admit your own guilt?

And we, Underwood, enjoyed being his accomplices. That's true. But that does not mean that we also want to be Spacey's accomplices.

Frank Underwood is, without question, someone you can miss. Like all the other big roles of Kevin Spacey, whom he literally played. But Underwood / Spacey also implies that we do not know "the whole truth" yet. That "things in politics as in life" are not always as simple as shown. Honestly?

At least that's what he claims: he has ambiguously called the video "Let me be Frank". You can translate that with "Let me be Frank", but also with "Let me be completely open". He says, "I certainly will not pay the price for something I did not do." Only, who speaks? Frank Underwood or Kevin Spacey? That this is not to be separated, is quite the subtext of the video. It's as brilliant as it is bizarre.

"Do you miss me?" He asks in the end. And knows that there can only be one answer to that: Of course we miss you!

He remains who he is

The only problem is that, as Spacey rightly says, things are not that simple. That the perfect actor can disappear into roles does not mean that he really disappears. He remains who he is. And maybe this is a person who imposes himself on 14-year-olds and holds them against their will on the genitals. A serial offender whose aggressive sexual advocacy transcends moral and legal barriers. A criminal whom nobody would miss.

Whether this is so, however, only a court will be able to decide. On January 7, he will face the Nantucket District Court in Massachusetts, where he will be brought before the magistrate. Also in California is still being investigated against him and in six cases in the United Kingdom. In Massachusetts alone, he could face up to five years imprisonment for sexual violence and assault.

"If he should be innocent," summed up a commentator on Youtube the Spacey video, "then this would be brilliant." If he is guilty, then it would be dismaying. "

That's how it is.