I never expected to be admitting to anyone that I've been
binging on a TV series, much less one about politics. It's bad enough to binge on anything,
chocolate maybe, but television? Well, my
cousin Doug tricked me into it by coming down from Dallas a few weeks ago,
shopping with me for an Apple TV remote and then conveniently installing the
darn thing. A couple of episodes of
"House of Cards" and I was hooked.
Admittedly I had seen the British 3-episode series with the great Ian
Mackellan first, but the American version with Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright,
now at the end of its fourth season, has gone to 52 episodes and is still
running strong. Why? Well, it's superbly written, acted, directed
and produced, but it's very, very dark, and, if you take it too seriously, not
just as a piece of entertainment, but as a rather true-to-life slice of
America's political pie, then it's positively scary.
"House of Cards" is the story of Francis Underwood,
U.S. Senator and Majority Whip from South Carolina, and his wife, Claire, both
deeply driven and ambitious individuals, enmeshed in the political machinations
of the nation's Capitol. And what
machinations they are! Alongside Kevin
Spacey and Robin Wright is a superb ensemble cast with a Machiavellian plot
line that allows very little time, if any, for kitchen or bathroom breaks (no
commercial interruptions--aha!) each episode filled with twists and turns that
may or may not be unraveled until later in the season. The series as a whole traces the rise of the
Senator from South Carolina from Majority Whip to Secretary of the Treasury to
Vice-President to President, while his equally ambitious wife conspires both
with and against him to create her own ascendancy from U.S. Ambassador to the
UN to his running partner in next year's (i.e. Season's) forthcoming presidential
election. By the end of this fourth
season, if not long before, you know this couple will stop at--well, nothing,
actually, to achieve their path to power.
Does this show descend into melodrama, murder and mayhem,
and explicit and sometimes pointless sexuality?
Yes--at times, but for the most part it walks a finely rugged line in appealing
to mass audiences and prurient interests.
Believe it or not, the best comparison I can make is to Shakespeare's
"Macbeth," even to its use of an old dramatic technique, the aside to
the audience. At their common core both
works are about the corruption of power in high places and the inevitable fall
of those who get there. After four
seasons of devious and malevolent ascent, I predict that "House of
Cards," like "Macbeth," can go only downward, into death and
destruction. Attributed to Euripides
(but in fact erroneously), the statement "Those whom the gods would
destroy, they first make mad [with power]" could easily be the watchword
of this show.
