Veteran actress Dame Judi Dench said she’s forgiven Harvey Weinstein after his rape conviction and argued that Kevin Spacey has been “exonerated” in a new interview.
“I saw a bit of film of Harvey walking with two sticks, and you think, ‘Well…’” she told Radio Times, in an article that emphasized her empathy for Weinstein’s victims. “I knew Harvey, and I knew him well and worked with him, and I had none of that experience — very fortunately for me… I imagine he’s done his time.” Dench, a Quaker, mentioned her faith’s emphasis on second chances: “I don’t know, to me it’s personal — forgiveness.”
Her comments on Spacey were less hesitant. “Kevin has been exonerated,” she said, “and I hear from Kevin, we text.” Spacey, a friend of Dench’s since they worked together in 2001, was acquitted of sexual assault charges in a U.K. criminal trial in 2023, though he faces additional civil claims next year.
Weinstein, who was instrumental in Dench’s late-career Hollywood ascendance — she won an Oscar for Shakespeare in Love, which he produced — was convicted of rape and sexual assault after a barrage of accusations that spanned decades and remains incarcerated.
Dench has addressed the men’s conduct before. When allegations against Weinstein first surfaced in 2017, she issued a statement calling the accusations “horrifying” and expressing solidarity with his accusers. She has also previously defended Spacey’s artistic legacy, arguing in 2019 that his work should not be erased because of his personal conduct.
The actress also spoke about her deteriorating eyesight from age-related macular degeneration. Both of her eyes are now in an advanced stage of the disease, leaving her unable to read, drive, embroider, or watch television. “It’s a crusher,” she said.
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Dench confessed to worrying about her memory as well. While she can still summon Shakespeare’s texts from decades of stage work, she admitted she often can’t recall her schedule from day to day.
In the same interview, she said that Johnny Depp was her celebrity crush, and recalled Depp biting an earring off her ear during filming of Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides in 2011. “He jumped in, but he didn’t give me a kiss, he went for my ear and took my earring off with his teeth,” she recalled.
