Good Luck Trying to Get the Stars of House of Cards and Orange Is the New Black to Talk About Storylines

Kevin Spacey says there is never an appropriate time to discuss "spoilers"

By Chris Harnick Mar 20, 2015 10:00 PMTags
House of Cards, Season 3David Giesbrecht for Netflix

Kevin Spacey will never, ever spoil you. Ever.

The House of Cards star—along with his on-screen wife Robin Wright and Orange Is the New Black's Taylor Schilling—have a strict policy when it comes to their Netflix shows, fans and interviews.

"It's never OK," Spacey said regarding talking publicly about plot points of Netflix shows. "It never will be OK."

The conversation was sparked when Spacey and Wright were asked for their thoughts about House of Cards' third season ending at a recent Netflix press conference and Aziz Ansari, also on the panel, said he was only in season one of the series.

"I have such respect for the audience and the fact— as my fine friend has just indicated—there are people who still haven't watched season one…So I kind of have a policy about this: I won't discuss any plot points or anything that happens in any season and I haven't ever, for three years. As I said, it's one of the most satisfying parts of being in this show. I can't actually do it because I can't be the Spoiler in Chief," Spacey said.

Orange Is the New Black star Schilling, who was in attendance with Uzo Aduba, agreed.

"I don't really ever feel like there's an appropriate time to start talking about things because I so respect the experience that people have with these shows and I feel like it's a very intimate experience and it's one that is personal," she said. "I love the idea that people are just starting to get to know the world that we've created. Some people haven't even started season one, so I think it's sort of hands off and it's a beautiful way to be part of a process...It's lovely. It sort of just grows and floats on its own."

Netflix

Spacey said these days we're living in a "non-spoiler generation."

"In some ways I guess it means the watercooler conversation that used to happen when shows were on a particular night at a particular hour, people would talk about them the next day—it's just the watercooler has gotten much, much bigger and not in one place anymore," he said.

However, one thing he and Wright do is give input on scripts. "We're not potted plants," Spacey dryly said, noting that he usually suggests cutting down on the dialogue, especially during Frank Underwood's direct audience addresses.

"I might come up with a really, really terrible idea and Beau Willimon will tell me that's a horrible idea, but it will lead him to an idea that then he'll write or one of our writers will write and then he'll bring it to me and we'll look at the scene, and then Robin will look at the scene and she'll have an idea and there is a kind of wonderful openness," he said. "What I love most is we all challenge each other and that's great because it's through challenge and through questioning and through investigation that we will eventually reach what we think is the right thing."

"We get to go to work every day with a script and I can't tell you how much is modified from all of us putting our 2 cents in and having these epiphanies. ‘Wow, what if we did that?! And that will affect No. 11 and we're only on episode two,'" Wright told the assembled press. "The building of it, the architecture of it, is why we get up and go to work every day."