Wednesday, December 11, 2024
Oscar-winning actor joins Czech swing musician Jan Smigmator on stage for a night of jazz and swing classics.
Over the weekend, visitors at Malostranská Beseda in Prague got an unexpected surprise when Kevin Spacey, the Oscar-winning actor known for American Beauty and The Usual Suspects, joined Czech swing musician Jan Smigmator on stage.
The unplanned concert was reported by Czech music magazine Headliner.
Spacey, who was in Prague on a private visit, had come to Malostranská Beseda for dinner with Smigmator and his wife. Later, to everyone’s surprise, he stepped up to the stage for an impromptu musical performance.
According to Smigmator’s Instagram, the two had dined the night before at Sansho, a restaurant where parts of the movie FUBAR starring Arnold Schwarzenegger had recently been filmed.
Although Spacey is best known for his acting, he actually started his career in musical theatre and has always had a passion for music. He even played singer Bobby Darin in the film Beyond the Sea, which he also directed and co-wrote.
“Kevin is here on a private trip,” Smigmator told the Flash. “Not many people know that he began his career as a singer and still loves music. We have mutual friends among American musicians, and when he told me he loves Prague, we invited him to join a jam session, which he was happy to do.”
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Jan Smigmator is a well-known Czech swing singer who performs with his band, the Swinging Quartet. He has played internationally, including at Carnegie Hall in New York. He also hosts the Klub Evergreen radio show and has released several albums like Swing Is Back and Time To Swing.
After dinner at Malostranská Beseda, Spacey and Smigmator casually headed to the stage, surprising the small crowd of about two dozen people.
They were joined by pianist Mikuláš Pokorný and bassist Petr Dvorský. The group played an hour of swing and jazz classics, with Spacey and Smigmator singing Frank Sinatra’s “Strangers in the Night” and “That’s Life”, as well as Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World”.
Although Spacey has kept a low profile in recent years due to multiple accusations of sexual misconduct, which led to his firing from House of Cards and his replacement in Ridley Scott’s All the Money in the World, he was found not guilty in a 2022 New York trial. In 2023, he was also acquitted in a London court.
