Kevin Spacey's 'Nazi' and 'abusive' father in spotlight amid sex scandal
Kevin Spacey once described his father as a "normal, middle-class man" with "an absolute love of England".
His brother, Randall Fowler, portrayed him as a neo-Nazi sadist who sexually abused him through childhood.
Whatever the truth about Thomas Geoffrey Fowler, the allegations against the Hollywood actor have cast fresh scrutiny on a man who has cast a long shadow over Spacey life's
Embroiled in Hollywood's latest sexual harassment scandal, Spacey has apologised for an alleged attempt to seduce a 14-year-old boy more than 30 years ago.
The two-time Oscar winner denied recalling the alleged incident described by actor Anthony Rapp but attributed it to drunkenness.
Issuing a statement in which he also came out as gay, Spacey said the story had encouraged him to "address other things about my life", alluding to other "stories out there about me" that have been "fuelled by the fact that I have been so protective of my privacy".
Among the parts of the 58-year-old's life that have remained in the shadows has been his upbringing.
In an interview with Esquire magazine in 2002, he said his father was "a very normal, middle-class man, born in Caspar, Wyoming".
"But he had an absolute love of England. He spent the war here. I think he always fancied himself as an aristocrat. He admired things of that kind of sophistication; leather-bound books, beautiful watches, cufflinks . . ."
Thomas Fowler died on Christmas Eve in 1992. Spacey talked about going back to look through his father's belongings and finding letters to his son when he was at Juilliard in New York that he had never sent.
"Warning of the evils of the world… I read them and thought, ‘Why couldn’t you have sent them? Letters are meant to be shared!…," Spacey said. “Maybe he thought I wouldn’t have been able to accept the things he was saying when I was 20. Maybe I’m a different person now.”
But then there is the starkly different portrait of Thomas Fowler that Kevin's brother Randall has painted.
"There was so much darkness in our home it was beyond belief. It was absolutely miserable," Fowler told the Daily Mail in 2004.
Profile | Kevin Spacey
The man he described was a fanatical Nazi supporter whose home was filled with Third Reich memorabilia. Fowler, who is a Rod Stewart impersonator, said he was taken out of Cub Scouts by their father because the troop leader was Jewish.
The eldest son claimed to have been regularly whipped and raped by their father while their sister Julie also allegedly endured beatings before leaving home aged 18.
Kevin, meanwhile, "tried to avoid what was going on by wrapping himself in an emotional bubble", Randall told the newspaper.
"He became very sly and smart. He was so determined to try to avoid the whippings that he just minded his Ps and Qs until there was nothing inside. He had no feelings."
Kevin Spacey: Six Key Roles
The Usual Suspects actor and former director of the Old Vic in London has been asked about the stories about his father in the past but has never shed any light on the claims.
"I have no comment," Spacey told The Telegraph in 2004.
"OK, we won't go there," the interviewer said.
"Well, you might, but I won't," Spacey responded.
The answer was typical of a man who has famously kept his private life exactly that.
“What am I supposed to do? ” Spacey said once. “Tell everyone my deepest, darkest secrets, just because people want to know?”
