If there’s a chronic criticism of House of Cards, it’s that the ferociously conniving Frank Underwood makes it look ridiculously easy to steamroll Congress and play a sitting president for a patsy on his way to commandeering the Oval Office without a single vote being cast for him.
Chalk that up to the seductive acting gifts of Kevin Spacey. But now, after two seasons of his murderous ascension to America’s throne, it’s time for Frank to take his lumps on a bumpy ride – and the only way is down – when Netflix’s acclaimed series returns for its third season on Sunday on OSN First HD.
The fact that the Democrats don’t want him on the ballot at the next election is the least of his problems.
Russia’s President Petrov (Lars Mikkelsen) – almost a dead ringer for Putin – is putting him through the political wringer over the Middle East. Meanwhile, a former confidant, fed up with being ignored by Frank, is now working for a rival.
Yet, we still secretly root for Frank. He may be a killer – but, my goodness, he gets legislation passed and nicely sucker-punches his way through the gridlock that so often afflicts Washington. Spacey seconds that emotion.
“I think that what’s been maybe the most interesting conversations that I’ve had with people who have watched the show – be they politicians or be they just people in the public or friends of mine – is that: ‘Say what you will about Frank and his methods. He’s very effective,’” he says.
“It must be enormously frustrating for Obama,” Spacey told the March issue of the British GQ magazine. “There does seem to be in the US now an ideology and an entrenchment that has stopped people doing what they are hired to do, which is govern rather than run for office the whole time.”
President Obama joked in 2013 that he wished Washington could be as “ruthlessly efficient” as it seems to be in House of Cards. “Man, this guy’s getting a lot of stuff done,” he said.
For fictional President Underwood, however, the prime threat to his survival lurks at home, where Robin Wright, in her elegantly toxic portrayal as Claire, his wife and now First Lady – described by Spacey as “a formidable Lady Macbeth” – now has even more screen time and grand ambitions of her own, to blow the lid off their marital pressure cooker.
Early reviews hint that Spacey’s performance this season tops those of Bryan Cranston as Walter White in Breaking Bad, and the late James Gandolfini as Tony Soprano in The Sopranos, to cement his rep as the best actor on television. And why not? His Oscars for American Beauty and The Usual Suspects now have company after recent wins at the Golden Globes and the Screen Actors Guild awards.
Spacey also reaffirmed his status as a class act and a friend of the UAE when he skipped the SAG Awards ceremony in Los Angeles last month to keep a promise to attend an Arabic play, Dhow Under the Sun, put on by young theatre students he had mentored in Sharjah.
Spacey may soon find himself with even more time for his young protégés, if the America’s House of Cards follows the third-season arc of the original BBC version – in which the prime minister’s wife orchestrates his brutal demise.
On the red carpet at last month’s Golden Globes, when asked if he is doomed this season, Spacey gave this cryptic reply: “As long as they want to keep doing it and I’m having great a time doing it ... We’ll just continue to tell the story as long as we feel there’s a story worth telling.”
• House of Cards season three begins at 11.20pm on March 1 on OSN First HD. It will also be available from February 27 on Netflix