In the political drama, House of Cards, if anything has been more menacing than the dirty politics that unfolds through the show, it is Claire Underwood’s (ably portrayed by Robin Wright) well-thought out moves from the beginning, right when she was just the wife of a Congressman, plotting and planning to step up the ladder to be in power. And Claire grew, by leaps and bounds, eventually. Step by step, she became the most powerful woman in the United States in the final season of the show streaming on Netflix.
In reality, however, it would pain her to be the president of the US. “What a nightmare it would be, given what politics is today,” she said as a room full of journalists from the Asia-Pacific region laughed out. Wright was speaking during a session at the See What’s Next Asia event of Netflix in Singapore, last week. “It is so ugly. Really, it is tragic the way protocols are been thrown out the window, traditional ways are out the window. And I really feel it's become really dark and ugly,” she added and said she could not imagine her being a part of it. “I mean if you could be a part of it, you could be a member of a chiefdom and you knew you were going to succeed in achieving goodness and betterment for the world, true relationships for the countries within. If you knew that you have that as a guarantee, then I would go up. But I just don’t think it is possible.”
While addressing the session, Wright sat on an elevated platform, poised and self-assured, seldom moving and always attentive, cross-questioning often if she missed a part of the question thrown at her. She spoke slowly and softly. At times, thinking through the questions coming her way. At other times, trying to be funny amidst the series of serious questions. It was as if she had internalised the character, Claire Underwood, that she has essayed for more than six years. As if the character had taken precedence over the real Wright.
On being asked if it is difficult being an actor in Hollywood in today’s climate, she first spins a laugh-worthy answer: “I don’t know because I kind of quit acting,” she said, moving on to seriously addressing the state of things right now: “I don’t know. Finishing House Of Cards, six years, great run, having tasted the field of directing, I don’t feel like an actress right now. And I am seeking out things to direct more than act right now.”
Wright, since the second season of the show, has on and off directed a few episodes of the show—the most recent being the finale. The bug bit her early on and there is no way she could go back from direction any more. Over a span of 35 years of being an actor, since the time she was a teenager, there have been numerous learning experiences. “You learn something from every director that you work with. Things you would like to emulate and things you would never do. And having an experience of 35 years—that is a lot of intel that you download. Having become a director recently and still at the nascent stage of it, learning always of course, the benefit of watching directors give poor direction is probably greater,” she said. There is one thing that has stood out for her though. “One thing I try to do as a director is never tell an actor, 'Don’t put your hand like that.' The word 'don’t' is the most distractive for an actor.”
Replying to a query by THE WEEK on how most women filmmakers have had difficulties finding financiers for their films, and if it is difficult to be a woman and a director, she said, she is yet to find that out. Her answer was followed with a mild laugh as she paused (the pauses were inherent throughout the hour-long session) and began talking again. “I think it is a necessity at this time to break convention. The only thing that works is repetition of the new. So, if we continue to put ourselves out there, insist that we are up for the same role as a director for that film [only then things will work],” she said, as she recalled how she lost a film that she really wanted to direct, recently.
“That was a big studio movie, which I lost to a male director, who is a great director. I think there was this thing that, ‘we didn’t want to give it to a rookie’. Well, the rookie is gonna keep banging on that door until they let me prove myself. And yes, I am learning, and I am not as skilled, meaning I haven’t had as much time to develop myself as he has had. My skill is only going to get better if you let me to do it more. And we are gonna just have to keep calling, keep the emails going. It is like selling your used cars frequently,” she added.
Her co-actors from House of Cards—Patricia Clarkson and Michael Kelly—have earlier credited Wright for saving HoC when the show was in danger. Last year, when the #MeToo movement broke in the United States, the lead actor, Kevin Spacey, too, was accused. Netflix had taken a stern step and announced it would not work with Spacey anymore. There was a crisis situation because no one knew how the show that ended at a cliffhanger, would continue. The reports, at the time, suggested that Wright played an important role in getting the show back and running.
The crisis, she said, was going on. “It was a current affair. It was a part of our social fabric. Everybody was alarmed and shocked and it was in the news. Because the climate was so sensitive and hot at the same time, it was a conversation that we all had—me, the showrunners, Netflix. We realised we needed to take a pause and let the dust settle and really digest. And let us decide what do we do collectively, what is the best thing for the show, the fans?”
The show, having completed its fifth season a few months before that, already had a lot of followers waiting for a new chapter to unfold where Wright’s character, Claire Underwood would take the reins of America’s politics from Spacey’s Frank Underwood. “[We had] five years of hard work, five years of added fans following the show. We decided to talk in a couple of months and shut down. We really assessed in that time what was the right thing to do. Ultimately, after Christmas, we decided the finish off the show the way we always intended,” she said.
But there were things beyond it, too, that everyone thought of. Probably, in the present climate, that’s the most profound thought too. “The reason that I wanted it to continue was because we could have put over a thousand people out of employment in the state of Maryland, who had been given the assurance that they are going to have that security—children to feed, mortgages to pay. It was insane. We were just going to leave them to dust? Not fair!”
That a lot of people are still waiting for a next season amuses her a little. On a query that even the season six finale seemed to have ended on a cliffhanger, she said, it is very interesting that a lot of people say that. But, “No, we are going to say good night to House Of Cards. We never saw it that way. It’s opened up my mind too. Isn’t that interesting? May be this is because of the streaming platform. It is endless where we could go. But no, we are not going there.”
She wants to focus on directing films. The kind of films she would like to direct is not isolated as far as the theme is concerned. “I would like to do a great comedy that’s never been done. A great old Woody Allen style comedy. I would also like to do a beautiful love story,” she said.
The one that she is about to direct next winter is about a woman who loses her husband and child from a terrorist bombing and how she deals with the grief. “And how, we as society, try to pull people out of the grief, thinking it is time to re-enter society. But she can’t re-enter because she realises that she can’t be good for society in that person in grief. She goes out into the wilderness to love life again, to not just be wallowing in her own,” she said talking about her next film.
The learning on House of Cards has been immense for her, even to hone her skills as a director. “To have a family, like I have in House of Cards, and have a support system like that, I am so grateful. I learnt how to be a director on that show. It felt like being at home and [at the same time] being at cinema school because we have some seasoned crew members on our show. Our camera operator has been in the business for 42 years, operating the camera. He has worked with Oliver Stone, Martin Scorsese. He taught me how to look through the lens, what do you want and why do you want that, what lens would you pick up because of that. Forever grateful for that. The evolution has been just having an equipped support system, teaching me in every episode that I directed. I was always learning. And he would send me home with homework, saying, ‘go, watch this film’.”
Wright didn't just grow professionally as an actor and director on the show, but also individually. When asked if she would continue to fight against the gender pay parity fight now that she is turning director, she said, “I think the fight should be simply for equal work-equal pay. This is not just a broad comment on equality, it is very specific—why do you do exactly the same job, work the same amount of hours, write exactly the same column—I should get paid the same. That's it!”
She would push for that as much as she can. “Till the end and for afterwards,” she said, adding that she has seen the change. “Everybody is speaking out, saying that it is not fair. I didn't speak out in season one when I was doing less, when my character was on-screen less and I wasn't putting as many hours as the other characters. It wasn't until season three, when I was like, 'wait a minute, I am working my ass off and I am getting less'. We really need to be clear on that line. This is not a generality, of no matter what. No, it is a matter of what. I have seen the salaries go up for women because it is open in the room. This is not something that's lying idle in the corner, being silenced. It is out there. And, studios and producers cannot deny it. And I think agents are pushing for their clients,” she said with a glimmer of hope.
