Please welcome Kevin Spacey.
Thank you.
Welcome to France.
Hello, good morning. How are you, Ted?
Very good, very good. Welcome.
Thank you.
So season four premieres on Netflix in France for the first time. How does it feel to be
here and to celebrate it?
Every time I've come to France since we launched House of Cards, I have to say,
the French people have embraced the show, and the character. I have not been
able to walk down the street or go into a restaurant without people either coming
up and being incredible, friendly and very kind or being slightly afraid and staying
away from me.
In the whole breadth of your work, where does Francis Underwood live for you?
Well, the challenge of taking on a character that has so much complexity, I was
really blessed when we began to have the idea and the notion of taking on this
role with David Fincher and, and then Beau Willimon who was our showrunner.
These two men are so creative and so challenging and so precise in the way in
which they work with actors, and in terms of the precision of the writing, I have to
say, I think Francis is probably one of the most remarkable characters I've ever
been able to play. And the great fun for me is that with each
season, I learn new things about this man, and obviously, all the relationships
that he has, but also, the relationship that he has with the audience, which is incredible
fun. I'm enormously grateful for the experiences I had before taking on Francis.
I got to do Richard III with Sam Mendes before we started the production, and I
also think that the work that I was able to do at the Old Vic in the ten years before
was also really important in helping me grow as an actor. I feel like all of that
work helped me prepare to tackle such a complex man.
So your performance and your ability to create it on the heels of Richard III kind
of rooted it more in Shakespeare in a way that made it not feel as American. It
made it feel much more global.
Yeah, definitely global. And I think while there are many people who probably
believe that direct address was invented by Ferris Bueller, it was actually
invented by Shakespeare. And he created it in Richard III, which is different from
Shakespeare, the monologue or the prologue where a character might speak to
the whole audience. Direct address is literally looking at individual members of
the audience. And having had that experience of taking Richard
III around the world, and being able to look into the eyes of audiences everywhere
in Asia, in Turkey, in London and New York and San Francisco it was a really remarkable
experience to see how much audiences dig being in on the know. You know, there's a kind of
complicity that I think even now, our audiences in House of Cards really enjoy the sense that
they're in on the private thoughts of this man, Francis Underwood. Of course, you know,
as things happen and things unveil themselves, they might
get a little scared that they've been supporting this guy, but that's the sort of
wonderful moral ambiguity of what the audience goes through as well as the
characters.
Are you ever surprised from country to country how people perceive Francis and
how they talk to you about Francis?
Yes. I suppose it's interesting simply because the show has been so successful
in so many countries. It seems to transcend borders and I don't think it's only
because people are fascinated with American politics, but because the politics of
life are all over the world and all over the globe, so it's been very interesting to
see how people identify with these characters so much, regardless of where
they're from.
And on top of the gift of a great character, you also got to make television history
with this show, launching all episodes at once a twenty-six episode order, the first
television show to win a primetime Emmy having never aired on television.
What gave you the courage to jump into something like that?
Well, I mean, it starts, obviously, with the show, with David Fincher, with Beau
Willimon, and you remember when we had the idea... we went and we pitched,
the idea of the program to all of the networks, and every network thought it was a
really interesting idea, and every network was really engaged, and kinda wanted
to do with us, but every network insisted that we do a pilot, except one.
Ted and Netflix did their remarkable analytics and had a sense, I think, that
audiences would dig something that was a political drama with Fincher and
myself involved, and you guys turned to us and said, “No, we don't need you to
do a pilot. How many do you want to do?” And we were like, “Two seasons?”
It was the worst negotiation of all time!
Part of what made it exciting for us was that Netflix was so willing to be
courageous and step forward. It absolutely made sense to me that one of the
major companies that had done very well as a porthole for content and
Netflix had done extremely well was eventually going to get into the game of saying,
“Well, if we want to compete, we're gonna have to start doing original content.”
So it didn't surprise me that a company stepped forward. What surprised me was
that a company stepped forward with such courage and such a big commitment,
and went forward with an idea, and believed in it, and gave us, as creators, a
really long runway to be able to tell the complex story one wanted to tell.
How much of the success of the story do you think is tied to the length of the
commitment and the infrastructure that goes with that?
I think a lot of it. I think that it's an exciting thing to be able to say that we have
partners who trust the creative vision that we had, who were willing to take the
long view rather than the short view, and through the process of discovering that
audiences love being in control, as you well remember, there were many
discussions about how we should release it. Should we do this many? And then
this many? And this many? And ultimately, the notion that you could drop the
entire season at once that the water cooler moment for audiences has expanded and changed.
It's no longer necessarily in the office, it’s more than that, it's online. And luckily,
we live in a pretty nonspoiler generation so that's been pretty cool to see how people
have understood. You know, I can't talk about any of the specifics in the
show, and people get frustrated by that. But I say, I can't be the spoiler in chief
because there are people who are just now, this year, discovering season one.
Yeah
And particularly in countries where Netflix is new, we have to recognize that
everyone will catch up to the show when they want to and when they can. It’s
an exciting thing that it's there, and that people can always see it.
It has kind of started its own etiquette when you can talk about things; how you
can talk about things.
That's right.
And you've told a great story about China and your reaction with the fans in
China.
Yes, the show is very huge. I did a film in China a couple of years ago, and I
could walk down a street in Guangzhou with my friend, Daniel Wu, who was the
star of this film I did this fully financed Chinese film. Being with him in China
is like being with Tom Cruise. I mean, he's a huge star and next to him,
everyone thought I was his bodyguard. And then a few years later, I went to Macau about
a year and a half ago to do a concert in Macau, and I walked onto the stage
House of Cards has been playing for about a year, two yearsI
walked onto the stage and it was as if some rock star had walked onto the stage. Three
hundred Chinese raced the stage and spent the entire
concert taking selfies with me in the Background. I got back to Hong Kong that night
and I asked a number of friends of mine, “What the fuck has happened since
I was last in China?” He said, “Oh, House of Cards. It's so big in China.” I
said, “Well, I've heard and understand that the Chinese government rather enjoy it.”
And he said, “Yes, that is true.” But he said, also for the common man, Francis
Underwood is perceived as someone fighting against corruption.
It's always lost in translation, sometimes, yeah.
It took me about a day and a half to get my head around that. But yes, the show
and the character has become very popular.
In China, it's available on a VOD service, but it's wildly popular like it is
everywhere else in the world. We wanted to open it up to the audience to ask
you some questions.
I have to ask about season five because Beau Willimon has left the series. I
want to know if the show is going to have a different direction now that Beau is
not there.
Well, Beau was very tired. He's been working nonstop since we began. He's a
remarkable man, we've had an incredible experience and without question, I'll
miss him being there every day. But the writer's room is the same writers that we
had in season four. Nothing is changed in terms of the quality of the work that
we're going to be doing. Beau and I began thinking about the new season, as we
did every year, sort of about midway through the shooting of the previous
season. So much has been discussed, much has already
been put on the table, lots of very interesting ideas, and we're excited
now that the writing process is happening. We will begin season five soon
enough.
It should be noted, Beau has a place in television history, and that his first
television show he's ever done is House of Cards. Pretty phenomenal.
Can you talk a little bit about working with Joel Kinnaman in season four?
Spacey: I've had an incredible time. He's funny, he's challenging, we’ve very much
enjoyed working with each other. He's also a stage actor. He does a lot of
theater and talent definitely runs in that family.
Mr. Spacey, given that we're in the run up to the Presidential election, do you
mind sharing how you think Mr. Underwood compares to the most interesting
candidates?
Well, you just need to remember that he's a fictional character. And that some of
the candidates running appear to be fictional characters. It's just been very
interesting for audiences everywhere, particularly American audiences, to look at
politics, look at how we expose things in our program, and that there are many
times when we will finish a sequence. We'll have a storyline that we will be
attacking, and I will leave the set and go to my hotel room, and I will wonderhave
we gone too far? Have we crossed the Rubicon? Is there something we've
done that feels unreal and kind of unbelievable and kind of crazy? And then I
turn on the television and I watch the news and I think we haven't gone far
enough.
You're friendly with Bill Clinton. What does Bill think of Francis?
I love that House of Cards.
Have you talked to other politicians about what they think of House of Cards?
Yes, I've been involved in the political world for a very long time and I know a lot
of politicians Republicans and Democrats and quite frankly, I hear both ends of
the spectrum. I hear those that say it's very cynical and dramatic, it's not real, it
has nothing to do with the way things are, and then I speak to other politicians
who say it's closer to the truth than anyone would like to know. So I've heard
both sides of it. But no matter what, Democrats and Republicans in my countrypeople
seem to really dig the show whatever side of the political spectrum they
come down on.
I guess we all agree that most of us do watch TV series on smartphones. Did
you ever imagine that people would watch in this way and what's your opinion
about it? Does it bother you?
I hope I fill your screen. That's all...
I was lucky enough to see you on stage at the Old Vic playing Richard III. For
me, that performance was back to basics. You mentioned that you learned a lot
as an actor from that production that you applied to House of Cards. Can you
elaborate on that a bit more?
Yes, I can tell you that when I made the decision in the year 2000 to move to
London to start a theater company, to do a play every year, or two plays every
year, for what became a twelve year tenure, I was at a place where I wanted to
challenge myself in a different way than I had been challenging myself in film. I
didn't want to fall into making a lot of movies I probably shouldn't make and I
wanted to become a better actor. And what I know now, as I sit here, is that the
twelve or so plays, or thirteen plays I did in the period of time from 2003 until I left
the Old Vic last August, changed me. To work with Trevor Nunn, to work with Matthew
Warchus, to work with Sam Mendes, to work with Thea Sharrock, to work
with the actors I worked with, the kind of parts I did, the fact that you get
up every single night, and that you can get better, is for me, like tennis. You get up
eight times a week and play tennis. It's the same rules, but it's a different game.
And for an actor like myself, I learn so much from the doing, the act of being watched,
the changes that you go through when you learn about a character and about
yourself, and about an audience every night. I know for myself that I would
never have been prepared to take on the role of Frank Underwood twelve years ago.
But all the work I've done since I went to the Old Vic, I believe helped prepare
me for being able to play a character on a very wide and large landscape.
Well, thank you, Kevin, for being here and on behalf of everyone at Netflix, it’s
been and continues to be a great honor.
Thank you. I'm looking forward to your new talk show on Netflix
Yes. It's gonna be very shortlived. Thank you again. We're going turn it back
over to Jonathan.
Thank you all very much.
Thank you, everybody.