In what may very well be the disgraced actor’s last role, Stephen Collins played a pedophile priest in the award-winning short film Penance.
The 11-minute movie just features Stephen and his Revolution co-star David Lyons. According to the synopsis, the latter character, “Thomas Walker,” learns more about his past while on a mission to “cleanse his inner demons.” The summary continued, “That begs the question: Can we ever truly find forgiveness? And just how far will one go to get it?”
Based on one scene available online, Stephen’s character hopes the answer to that first question is “yes.” While counseling the other character, Stephen’s character says, “I’ve never known a person that wasn’t in need of forgiveness at some time.”
Of course, in light of Stephen’s apparent confession that he molested young girls, the themes in the movie are particularly chilling. Ron Truppa of the Catalina Film Festival told Inside Edition of looking back at Stephen’s role with the new information in mind, “It’s just one of those things that are really uncanny when art imitates life like that. It was a stellar performance.”
The Jeff Wolfe-directed film earned multiple awards before the scandal broke. It was set to screen at the recent Denver and San Jose Film Festivals, but Jeff said on his Facebook page that the festivals pulled it at the last minute.
“When I cast Stephen Collins, I had no idea there might be a connection between his real life and the part I asked him to play,” he told People in a statement. “I found the recent allegations particularly shocking, as my film is meant to speak to victims of abuse and the idea that the effects of abuse never really go away.”
