Kevin Spacey denies sex abuse claim during testimony at his trial

Actor Kevin Spacey has taken the stand at his civil trial in New York to deny the claim that he sexually assaulted a 14-year-old at a house party in 1986.

"They are not true," he said of the allegations by Anthony Rapp, who is seeking $40m (£36m) in damages.

Before taking the stand on Monday, Mr Spacey won a victory when a judge dropped one of the claims brought by Mr Rapp.

Mr Spacey is separately facing five charges in the UK of sexual assault.

Mr Rapp, 50, who is also an actor and known for his role in Star Trek: Discovery, filed a complaint against Mr Spacey in 2020 saying that he touched him inappropriately when Mr Rapp was 14 years old and made sexual advances toward him.

Taking the stand in his own defence in the third week of his trial, Mr Spacey said he was shocked when Mr Rapp went public with his allegations five years ago.

"I didn't know how this could possibly be true," he said, adding he would not have been sexually interested in Mr Rapp as he was underage.

Mr Spacey also discussed growing up with a father who he described as a "white supremacist and neo-Nazi".

The 63-year-old House of Cards actor said he was "forced to listen to hours and hours and hours" of "hatred" from his father, which instilled in him a "hatred" for prejudice and bigotry.

This, he said, has also discouraged him from publicly disclosing that he was gay sooner.

"I have never talked about these things publicly," he testified.

Mr Spacey announced he was choosing "to live as a gay man" as part of his first response to Mr Rapp's allegations, which was criticised for deflecting attention from the accusations against him.

Mr Rapp says that Mr Spacey was around 26 or 27 years old when he met him at a party at his Manhattan apartment.

According to court documents, he claims that during the party Mr Spacey lifted him up and his hand "grazed" his buttocks. He alleges Mr Spacey then placed him back down on a bed and "briefly placed his own clothed body partially beside and partially across" his own.

In opening arguments early this month, his lawyer said Mr Spacey's behaviour was "wrong and frankly unacceptable".

Last week, Mr Rapp was asked if he has lied about his allegations against the Oscar-winning actor.

"I have not," he told the court. "It was something that happened to me that was not okay."

On Monday morning, Judge Lewis A Kaplan dismissed Mr Rapp's claim of intentional infliction of emotional distress, leaving only one claim - of battery - to be weighed by the jury.

The judge had already previously dismissed a charge of sexual assault, ruling the statute of limitations had expired.

Separate sex assault charges - alleging that Mr Spacey groped an 18-year-old at a restaurant in Nantucket, Massachusetts, in 2016 - collapsed in 2019 after the actor's lawyers argued the accuser had manipulated text messages on his phone.

In August, a judge ruled that Mr Spacey must pay $31m to the producers of House of Cards for the costs they incurred after firing him from the show.

In July, he entered a not guilty plea in London to criminal charges of sexually assaulting three men over a decade ago. That trial is due to begin in June 2023.