House of Cards: Kevin Spacey on giving audiences the complexity they crave

 RadioTimes, Susanna Lazarus, 14 February 2014

Interesting tidbits:

On our fascination with anti-heroes… 
What’s happened over the last fifteen years is you have characters that are not good at their jobs, that have terrible family lives, that are anti-heroes – complex stories that are told over a long period of time. Clearly the fact that these shows have become so hugely popular is it’s what audiences want. They want complexity, they want things that take a long while to unravel, they invest in it in a way that a big superhero movie wishes people would invest in. They tweet about it, they blog about it, they talk about it, they debate it – they are so invested in characters, from Breaking Bad to Dexter. The audience has told the filmmakers and the creatives,  “give us complex stories, give us characters that aren’t cookie cutters.”

On breaking the fourth wall… (talking directly to the audience)
It was created by Shakespeare so there is a certain Shakespearean quality. When I did Richard III I found it very useful actually having audiences to look at for nearly 200 performances – I was able to look in people’s eyes in those direct addresses which I miss. Now I’m just looking down the barrel of a lens. I try to treat the camera as if it’s my best friend, the person you would tell anything to, everything to – the things you wouldn’t even tell your wife.

On the shift in focus from movies to television… 
There is a reason why in the last fifteen years people have moved into television as the movie business started to focus on big tent-pole films and superheroes and action stuff. Those aren’t the kind of movies I make so I’m not missing out on anything. It’s been absolutely proved that some of the best filmmakers, actors, directors and writers have moved into television because the ground is very fertile and why wouldn’t you go where the ground is fertile?