Last night I attended a screening of the first two episodes of House of Cards, followed by a conversation with David Fincher. I had already watched the entire series on Netflix, but it was great to see the show on a huge screen. Unlike other shows I’ve seen in special theater broadcasts, House of Cards felt more like a movie in the large format.
Love this:
6. Fincher would not have made House of Cards Without Kevin Spacey
When Fincher read the pilot script, he couldn’t think of anyone but Kevin Spacey for the main role. “We needed a cunning linguist, we needed someone who could run for public office, we can see him shaking hands.” When he met with Spacey he even told him that if he didn’t get Kevin for the role, he wasn’t going to make it. Spacey was very interested but was just about to go do thirteen months of Richard the Third. He asked Fincher if he could wait a year for him to play the part, and they did.
Spacey makes the show what it is. Without him, I agree, the show may not even be worth making.
Alright, sorry, one more. I’m not going to quote the whole article, but this is sooo good. It’s such an accurate description of the character:
7. Fincher describes Spacey’s character Francis Underwood as a Machiavellian who is taking you under his wing, a poet figure but he always has secrets.
“He’s not Kasparov (chess grandmaster), he doesn’t see four moves ahead of his opponent. He kind of comes into a room and knocks over the chess board, says ‘oh, was somebody playing this?’ And he puts it back the way he wants it to be. And he creates chaos and ***** things up to make people look a certain way and he is able to work his magic to make people think it was there idea.”
Much more in the linked article.