Michelle Williams Comments On Recasting Kevin Spacey Amid Sexual Assault Controversy

Kevin Spacey was removed from Ridley Scott’s film “All the Money in the World” after his sexual assault allegations surfaced, and the change was something the whole cast adjusted to.

Michelle Williams, who plays Gail in the film, told People that they welcomed the adjustment because sexual assault is something that Hollywood needs to start battling.

“It’s kind of beautiful. It can be done, rewriting the ending to something. We had the resources to do it and not everyone is lucky enough to be able to rewrite endings,” she said. “I know that meant a lot to me personally to go from this sort of sad story of what happens in the fallout of this kind of behavior, and how many other lives are affected, no lives more than the people that Kevin hurt. It was disheartening. It felt so defeatist. And so I’ve enjoyed being part of this story. It makes other things seem possible.”

Because of Spacey’s allegations, not to mention the scandals faced by Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein, Williams said everybody on set is now acting more professional.

“It’s been such an interesting time in the last few months. It’s been on one hand brutalizing and traumatizing and on the other hand I feel like it [has] given me this like swoop of energy I’m not really accustomed to, it’s amazing. I feel alternate endings are possible all over the spectrum at this point in time. I feel like everything's up for grabs,” she said.

The director for “All the Money in the World” earlier told Entertainment Weekly that he was finalizing the music for the film in a U.K. recording studio when he heard the news about Spacey. “Someone was like: Guess what? And that’s where it began. I sat and thought about it and realized, we cannot. You can’t tolerate any kind of behavior like that. And it will affect the film. We cannot let one person’s action affect the good work of all these other people. It’s that simple,” Scott said.

The first actor Scott thought of to replace Spacey was Plummer. He called the actor up and when they met in New York, Plummer said yes to the project. It was a good move, because Scott received a Golden Globe nomination for playing the late oil tycoon, Jean Paul Getty.

“All the Money in the World” was released on Dec. 22.