Nominated for Best Actor in a Drama Series: Kevin Spacey for House of CardsMelinda Sue Gordon/The Associated Press
When the third season of House of Cards accidentally leaked online – for 20 minutes – earlier this month, the Internet raced to glean as much story as it could from the temporary slip. The Netflix show, after all, is the modern definition of digital binge-watching, its fans gorging on 13 episodes at a time, needing to know what happens next to Frank and Claire Underwood.
Spoiler alert: When last we saw the Vice-President and Second Lady (Kevin Spacey and Robin Wright), the power couple were well on their way to occupying the White House.
The man at the helm of the addictive show is executive producer Beau Willimon, who first proved his political bonafides to Hollywood with the 2011 George Clooney film The Ides of March. Willimon adapted it from his own stage play, which was inspired by his time as a press aide in Howard Dean's 2004 bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.
The Globe spoke to him on the phone ahead of the new season's premiere Friday morning.
You must have seen Sesame Street's House of Cards parody featuring Frank Underwolf. Do you think they got it right? Is Frank a wolf?
Actually, when I was first coming up with names for Frank Underwood, I had gone through a whole list of possibilities and one of them was 'Wolf.' It seemed a little too on the nose for our purposes, but for Sesame Street, I thought it was perfect. I also shied away from it because there was a Congressman
Frank Wolf from Virginia, so that wouldn't have been appropriate.
How much does House of Cards reflect the real-world Washington?
Are we trying to rip from the headlines? Are we trying to put a mirror up to what's happening now and have an exact reflection? No. In terms of some overlap, which is more coincidental than anything, yes, there are some direct parallels. But that's not our aim.
So America Works, Frank's sweeping presidential initiative this season – it wasn't inspired, say, by Obamacare?
You could draw parallels if you like. Big initiatives that presidents try to launch and run into resistance with Congress, that's an age-old story that goes back to the founding fathers.
The central storyline involving Russia – and Lars Mikkelsen as a dead ringer for Vladimir Putin – seems to dovetail nicely with current affairs.
That honestly is coincidental. When we began developing that storyline, the only thing that was going on with Russia was the upcoming Sochi Olympics. Ukraine had not happened. Crimea had not happened. The sanctions had not happened. If anything, the world's been playing catch up with us in the writer's room.
This season also features an appearance by members of Pussy Riot. How did that come to be?
Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova are great women who stood up for their beliefs and got imprisoned because of it. I met them at a Pen gala event in New York, and I was talking to them about the show because they were big fans; they had watched a lot of it on the plane trip over. I asked them if they were interested in potentially being on the show and they were game.
The atmosphere of House of Cards is rather serious. What's the mood like on set?
We're laughing all the time, and usually the reason we're laughing is because Kevin has one of the best senses of humour. He is one of the great mimics in the world. Sometimes between takes he'll just pop into Marlon Brando mode and everyone just halts for a second because we're all bending over laughing our asses off. He even does a William Hurt. You would think, how can you even do a William Hurt? He does a better William Hurt than William Hurt does William Hurt.