“I remember when (executive producer) David Fincher proposed the idea to me. He said, ‘Do you want to do a television show?’ and I said, ‘No, I don’t.’ I had been on a daytime soap opera for many years and I thought I wanted to be in film… He basically educated me to say this is going to be a new movement. He said, ‘Don’t you want to be part of the revolution in this industry that you’ve been in most of your life?’ And I said, ‘Yeah. I’m getting on that train.”
On directing episodes of the show:
“To be able to be given the opportunity to direct and learn how to direct on a show that is your family, it was an incredible experience and I’m so grateful for it because there was such safety. The team at Netflix are incredible people. They’re just good, down-to-earth people… you know you’ve got somebody supporting you the whole way.
On the show’s popularity:
“Everywhere. Every country. I’m always shocked and surprised by how many people know ‘House of Cards.’”
On working with Michael Kelly who plays Doug Stamper:
“We’ve been doing it so long and we are so close that it’s second nature to us. Every day we show up on the set and we can pop into that character and pop out of it so quickly. It was very creative and collaborative, that working environment.”
On playing Claire Underwood:
“As an actor you have to like your character no matter how evil they may be. You have to find the good in them. Well, she was a good wife, she stood by her man, I’m trying to think of something else… I think she was always there. The tenet was always there that she was going to become equally or more ruthless than Francis. But in the beginning, we never knew year to year if we were going to be picked up again so we always had version one and version two… ‘Are we ending the show after season 3? We don’t know, we could go on another year.’ It was always juggling balls… but we’ve always known she was going to ascend because the agreement between the two of them was I’ve got your back, you’ve got mine, the minute you don’t have my back, you’re dead.”
On life after ‘House of Cards’:
“I’ll be focusing on directing solely right now. I’m putting the acting off to the side a bit and hoping to do film.”