Emmy Spotlight: “House of Cards”

Where does one begin with House of Cards? It so clearly (I might even say desperately?) wants to be a prestige drama, and it has many of the hallmarks of such series. High-profile director and executive producer from the film world? Check. Even higher-profile movie star making the switch to television? Check. Famous, older film actress arguably staging a comeback in her most notable role in some time? Check, even if I did accidentally insinuate that American Horror Story is a prestige drama just now. In its production, its tone, and the style if not the quality of its writing, House of Cards has just about every characteristic one would assign to a prestige drama.

And yet House of Cards is not a very good show, is it?

Let me backpedal here a bit. House of Cards isn’t terrible. It’s perfectly fine. But it’s at its very best when it’s not aiming so damn hard at prestige. Frank’s monologues, lush with purple prose, are often ridiculous, but they are of such heightened, Shakespearean proportion that they enliven what can often be a very tedious show. House of Cards is at its best when it luxuriates in its pulpiness. The thrill of Frank murdering Zoe Barnes is a highlight, but it happens an hour in! Then we’re left to dry for several episodes, with nothing quite so earth-shattering to entertain us, and with a pace that slows to a crawl. At the end of the day House of Cards and Scandal share more DNA than the former might care to admit. That’s a shame, because the scandalous moments (no pun) are the real highlights of the show, and we could do with a great deal more of them.

Unfortunately such moments are few and far between for much of the season. That’s for a variety of reasons, not least of which is the show’s curious structure, which stretches storylines over many episodes and allows them to meander at languorous pace. Lucas’ investigation following Zoe’s murder is protracted, and comes to an abrupt end with his arrest, as we instead follow hacker Gavin Orsay on a strange tangent that remains unresolved by season’s end. Doug Stamper is preoccupied by Rachel Posner through much of the season, which means frequent detours into Rachel’s daily life, until Doug intervenes once more—all in the name of giving Frank Underwood yet another life to trample over and utterly ruin. (That said, Rachel’s apparent killing of Doug is another welcome shocker, though, and one that follows through on her promise to him in the season premiere. Frank and Claire’s impromptu threesome with Meechum is another great such moment.) In a binge watch this stop-start pacing might go unnoticed (though honestly, I think it’s actually more obvious), but when considering the episodes as a set, it’s hard to decide how valuable each of these tangents really is.

More than not delivering on the promise of the season premiere’s twist, the show is frustratingly content to move forward with a predictable inevitability toward its conclusion. There is never for a moment any doubt that Frank will not achieve his goal of ascending to the presidency. We are meant to marvel at the extent to which Frank manipulates Walker and everyone around him, but when it’s so very easy, what does it matter? Even Raymond Tusk, who we’re sold on as a big bad who can put Frank back on his heel, is beaten summarily and without much undue effort on Frank’s part. Frank’s schemes just simply work, every time, without fail. Even his seeming failures are intentional, another layer of manipulation, the villain getting himself captured on purpose. We likely need no more discussion on that tired cliché.

The persistence of low stakes non-drama falls largely on the glut of characters who are not named Underwood. So many characters are cyphers, such obvious pawns in Frank’s game that to get invested in them is near impossible. Even when the acting is good, as it is with Molly Parker’s Jackie Sharp, the writing doesn’t do enough to make these characters feel alive or three-dimensional. They all exist in relation to Frank, without ever providing any meaningful resistance to Frank. Drama thrives on conflict; stories thrive on a protagonist who faces obstacles. That’s true even when the protagonist is a villain, as Frank so unabashedly is. And when the writing is bad, as it is with President Walker, a bland, milquetoast, stupid man who through some miracle has been elected to his office, the problem is exacerbated that much more. Who cares if Frank usurps his presidency? The man is a moron. It’s basically a requirement of the plot that everyone be a pawn in Frank’s game, but that doesn’t make for very compelling drama, no matter how great the acting around it all is. Take the monologue that closes the first episode: Frank illustrates his grand design to us, and in the moment it’s invigorating, but we really need to see him challenged and it just doesn’t happen!

To its credit, the show is staged and shot in such a way that plays up this aspect of the writing—for example in “Chapter 17”, where Jackie Sharp and Remy scheme with Frank in his office; Jackie and Remy are shot together, facing the camera (and therefore Frank) as they talk, and every so often the camera cuts back to Frank, facing them, but not facing the camera head on. The alternating shots give the impression of Frank watching a play, which of course he is—one he’s written himself. When Jackie and Remy leave, Frank turns and addresses the audience, furthering this effect. I point this moment out, and the many others like it, to emphasize that there is no artistic failing on the part of the show—it’s well and thoughtfully constructed, and the idea that all these characters are puppets for Frank and Claire Underwood is effectively communicated in all aspects of the production. But when the show purports to be an ensemble drama, as well, when it expects the audience to care about Lucas or Jackie or Rachel independently of their association with the Underwoods, this device falters, and at times it breaks the show. In both the writing and within the story itself, everything the other characters do is in service of Frank Underwood, and never in resistance to him. If a character believes otherwise he is undoubtedly wrong, either lying to himself, or simply ignorant and naïve.

I fear I’m coming off more negatively than I intend to, so let’s address the nugget of a fantastic show that is nestled within House of Cards. I’m referring of course to the wonderful arc of Frank and Claire’s relationship, which takes center stage this season in a way that nearly manages to anchor the show despite the aforementioned flaws and frustrations. It’s no great surprise that Kevin Spacey is a powerhouse from top to bottom this season. The monologue at the end of the premiere is stunning, the shot of his cufflinks with just enough tongue in cheek. But really it’s that last shot of the season that takes first prize—it’s great enough to make you think you’ve been watching a wholly different show. The show, and Spacey’s performance, borrow liberally from Richard III, smartly so. Even when the script is unwilling or unable to properly shade the events of this story, Spacey’s performance finds nuance and subtlety (even with that accent).

But really, the MVP of this season is the stellar, absolutely fantastic Robin Wright. Claire’s story, though intermittently focused on throughout the season, is also the strongest of this set of episodes, whether it’s in wrapping up her season one storylines, or with the introduction of her military sex assault legislation midway through the season. Wright doesn’t hit a false note at any point. The dialogue is frequently terrible on this show, on the nose and expository, or else so luridly purple that no actor could possibly compensate. Well, no actor besides Kevin Spacey or Robin Wright, anyway. “I’m willing to let your child wither and die inside you if that’s what’s required,” is a thing of fucking beauty. Claire’s revelatory CNN interview is the centerpiece of “Chapter 17,” and it is marvelous, especially as juxtaposed with that episode’s quarantine at the Capitol. Frank is literally locked away, forced to watch Claire manipulate the interview solo, and he watches on television with loving admiration.

We’ve known for a while that these two really are a perfect pair, but this season foregrounds their marriage as a partnership in every aspect of their lives, and it does so to great effect. It’s bizarre to think of how functional and happy this marriage really is, considering the work these two get up to on a daily basis. Claire’s admission that she’d been raped is at once a lie and a truth, and it’s a revelation that propels her throughout the remainder of a season. By the end, she has left another life ruined, trampled again in the name of Underwood. There is that wonderful scene in the finale when, upon returning from the home where her latest victim, heavily medicated on lithium, is now suffering a literal psychiatric breakdown, Claire sits on the stairs and collapses into tears, breaking down for literally a second, before she regains her composure and continues to her bedroom. Robin Wright is impossibly good, completely encapsulating such a wide array of emotions in this scene. That she does this consistently throughout the season is nothing short of amazing, and I’d argue that she does more than even Spacey to elevate this material.

We should also take a moment to recognize Reg E. Cathy’s work as Freddy in his standalone episode late in the season, which feels—intentionally, no doubt—like something out of The Wire. In an initial binge, the episode feels abrupt and out of place, but it’s rightly been recognized as a standout moment of the season. It does something the rest of the show generally fails to do: it expands the scope and the context of Washington, and reminds us that there is a real world beyond all of this scheming. In addition it gives Frank his only failure of the season, and a personal one at that. We know, intellectually, that Frank and Claire have left a trail of (sometimes literal) corpses in their wake, and we’re meant to question the degree to which they feel remorse for their actions. So the idea that Tusk manages to torpedo the only thing remotely close to friendship that Frank has should be momentous, but instead that is isolated to this episode, and that’s a huge problem for the series. Of course we know Frank is a shark, but a little more insight into his emotions would go a very long way. That’s something a show like Scandal doesn’t do, and doesn’t have to do—but if House of Cards is going to be a serious drama, then it needs an episode like this. Not just an episode—it needs to feel like this all of the time, and outside of a few scattered moments, it doesn’t.

House of Cards has all the components of great television. It’s gorgeously shot, frequently well acted, and occasionally surprising, thrilling, and emotionally deep. But at other times it feels like a rote political procedural, with all the depth and subtlety of something like Political Animals. There’s nothing wrong, necessarily, with a show like that, but it results in a jarring tone when House of Cards tries to have its cake and eat it, too. As with Game of Thrones, House of Cards feels like a series that never quite coalesces, despite having many great constituent parts. It doesn’t feel complete, the way that Breaking Bad or Mad Men or True Detective does. It’s very fun for what it is, and when Spacey or Wright are on screen, it can even be magnetic. More often than not, though, it’s a mechanical progression of events in service of a character whose success is never in doubt. Whatever conflict is presented is often empty, there to prop up Frank Underwood, schemer extraordinaire. I’d like the next go around to be a little more challenging for him.

That said: also as with Game of Thrones, the finale leaves just enough unsaid to promise a strong third season—with Doug’s body waiting to be found and Rachel Posner on the loose, there are more than a few threads to be pulled that might unravel the Underwood presidency, and that’s a process that I’m still very intrigued to see. On that level, then, the show has succeeded. It just falls short of prestige.

7/10