House Of Cards

In about two months’ time, the sixth and final series of House Of Cards will lurch into in everyone’s Netflix algorithms, bringing to a close one of the most Netflix-iest of Netflix-s shows.  I never really knew what House Of Cards was for quite a long time.  People would obsess over the latest instalments, binge-watching recently-appeared seasons like mammoth chores in order to be able to keep up with dinner party discussions.  I would stare blankly ahead waiting for people to finish talking, like I do whenever someone mentions a football, or any other sport.  The odd glimpse I had caught always looked grey and serious, full of older people in suits being stern.  My attention was always tempted away by the likes of Love Island.

But then all this news emerged about my good old pal Kevin Spacey, and the salacious scandal-hunter within me wanted to know what all the fuss was about.  Honestly, it’s political correctness gone mad if a show or film can’t be made in Hollywood without everyone getting goosed and groped and made to feel powerless at the hands of those who exploit their power within a system that protects them from the scorn of the public eye.  It was time for me to judge for myself.

I say old pal, but I really only met Kevin once, about ten years ago.  He was old even then, especially up close.  I used to have a personality that couldn’t get enough of going out.  It was some winter weekend during my earlier days in London, way past midnight, and we were stomping the streets of the East End: myself, a friend visiting from Germany, assorted school pals and a flatmate I knew from university.  There was no special occasion, other than it being Saturday and we being young and alcohol being available in exchange for cash.  Whichever bars we had haunted were closing for the night, but someone knew someone who worked in theatre and was linked to a house party we could join.  These days, if any evening event involves more than one location, I will invariably ghost so hard during the changeover that I’ll be on the sofa in my pyjamas watching Parks & Recreation before the group has arrived at the second venue.  In those days, I was happy to traipse through the rain and cold with only a vague promise of more good times to come.

On arriving, I remember two things.  There was a room in which a lot of young actors were jumping about on a bed dancing to Britney Spears songs.  I didn’t go inside.  Then, in the living room, I recall us passing around Peruvian wine bowls.  This was because a friend of a friend had recently taken part in the BBC3 series Last Man Standing, travelling the world to compete in tribal games and bringing back their cultural heritage to London young professionals for appropriation.  My German friend was smoking out of the window when someone said “Kevin Spacey’s here.”  It sounded as ludicrous then as it does now.  It couldn’t be true.  Yet, staggering down the hall to the toilet, I passed a Hollywood legend, face hidden beneath a baseball cap, small dog at his feet, making a 3am arrival among a crowd under half his age.

My approach to celebrities has always been, for some reason, to pretend not to know who they are.  So, later, when I was sipping from the Peruvian wine bowl and a figure appeared in front of me saying “Hi, I’m Kevin,” my immediate response was to introduce myself casually and ask who he knew at the party.  Some of the boys were work friends, apparently.  My tally of drinks by that point should have had my synapses completely fudged, enough that all inhibitions should have been overrun and I should immediately have gushed that I knew who he was and I had seen him in American Beauty and what was he doing in this dirty flat bringing his face off the big screen to a real-life situation directly in front of me?  Instead, I asked if he wanted some wine and proffered him the Peruvian bowl.  He sipped without hesitation and asked where it was from.  I pointed at the friend who had been on the telly show wrestling Mongolian nomads and, bam, Kevin had beelined for him.  Ladies and gents, this other lad was better looking than me.  Happily cast aside, I knew then that I had a dinner party story that would last the ages: Kevin Spacey had chatted me up.  So, in 2013 when the first series appeared, I could smugly counter House Of Cards discussion with a true story about its star.  Kind of gives you the measure of my life’s value in the grand scheme of things really.

Years later, clicking play on season one, chapter one, there was that face again.  And it was speaking directly to me once more.  For an opening episode, House Of Card’s destruction of the fourth wall in the case of its main character(s) drew me in and on board within moments.  Despite my lack of knowledge about American politics (what is a caucus?), the Underwoods knew they could count on my vote pretty early on.  Kevin Spacey plays Francis Underwood, a congressman in the first series, whose ruthless ambition sees him stop at nothing to get on the seat that Trump occupies today.  And ruthless is a dramatic understatement.  He hasn’t just lost his ruth; he has willingly had it removed, murdered and the body incinerated, with someone else blamed for the crime.  And this is just the sort of Underwood efficiency and ambition I found myself getting on board with.

Wife, Claire, played by an effortless Robin Wright, whose face never moves and yet conveys the most perfect responses at all times, is a fellow Frank fan.  They’ve taken the part of their vows about forsaking all others very literally.  Their pact is to pursue only their mutual advancement, no matter the casualties, as long as they are outside their marriage.  To be honest, this is how most couples look to me.  To keep the drama up, cracks eventually start to break through in series three, but these are ruptured by a very American act, one I can’t even allude to without betraying massive twists of the plot.  When not conniving, Claire is often seen getting into and out of bed, and quite rightly, because she has wonderful pyjamas.  She works late; he works late, and they’re both always immaculately dressed.  I can’t do anything productive past 6pm and can barely keen my chinos on long enough to make it home of an evening.  They both have terrible rowing techniques.  At breakfast, Claire holds coffee with incredible smugness, while Francis cuts an apple into slices, which he then eats from a plate, proving to everyone that he is a psychopath.  They are both awful, but their exploitation of those around them is the fault of those around them that enable it, so you’ll join me in Team Underwood.

However, the Underwoods’ progression becomes rapid and you wonder if they couldn’t have drawn it out more to prevent things seeming so far-fetched.  But, at any point, you can check our political reality and realise that anything can, and does, happen.  Other characters come and go, as nobody is safe.  House Of Cards is not afraid to off anyone.  While some swirl around our power couple with nebulous roles like Jane Davis and Aidan Macallan, others loyally sign up as underlings.  You’ll feel sorry in two different ways for Edward Meechum, but it’s Doug Stamper I find most troubling, a part performed with painful rawness by Michael Kelly.  He is Francis’s Chief of Staff and never has anyone been striving harder for a positive end of year review.  Stamper has sacrificed his health, his relationships and his happiness in order to exceed expectations within his role.  There’s nothing he won’t do.  Taken for granted and never able to enjoy his salary, he must hate fun more than he hates the Underwoods’ enemies.

Roll on, then, November.  I’ll be clearing my diary to find out the Underwood’s final fate, though I will have to ration this to a single episode per evening, as it’s bleaker than an unexpected item in your bagging area and laugh-out-loud moments come at the rate of zero per episode.  Either way, it’s remained solid proof of Netflix’s storytelling chops, but I won’t miss Washington once it’s all over.  That place is dangerous.  See ya Kevin!