Claire Underwood

Lore & Background

Claire Hale Underwood is originally from the exclusive Highland Park enclave of Dallas, Texas. Her late father was a major Texas Republican. While studying Environmental Health and Chemistry at Radcliffe College in Cambridge, she met Francis J. "Frank" Underwood, a Harvard Law student from South Carolina. She subsequently achieved a masters in public health from Harvard University. She is from a wealthy family, and the show characterizes her as a "Dallas Debutante" and "Lily White". She recounts her father's taking her to Dealey Plaza, where John F. Kennedy was assassinated, and that it made her feel "so sad, so angry". She has a difficult relationship with her mother, Elizabeth Hale (Ellen Burstyn), who despises Frank and is disappointed in Claire for marrying him. Brian Stelter of The New York Times described her as Frank Underwood's conniving wife and described the Underwoods as "the scheming husband and wife at the center of 'House of Cards'". Hank Stuever of The Washington Post describes her as an "ice-queen wife". The Independent's Sarah Hughes echoes this description, saying Claire is so dedicated to the couple's schemes that it is clear she will execute them herself if Frank wavers.

In Their Own Story

In season 1, Claire is the CEO of an environmental group while serving as her husband's primary accomplice. After President Garrett Walker (Michel Gill) goes back on his promise to make Frank Secretary of State, Frank enlists Claire to help him get revenge and propel them both to positions of power. She and Frank scheme nightly over a cigarette. Frank says of Claire: "I love that woman, I love her more than sharks love blood." Claire is aware of Frank's sexual relationship with reporter Zoe Barnes (Kate Mara) and approves of it as long as it achieves their ends. She herself has an affair with an old boyfriend, Adam Galloway (Ben Daniels). By the end of the season, Walker appoints Frank the Vice President of the United States, making Claire the Second Lady of the United States. In season 2, Claire's main storyline is her advocacy, as Second Lady, for a sexual assault prevention bill. During a nationally televised interview, she admits that she was raped in college and that her rapist, Dalton McGinnis (Peter Bradbury), is now a high-ranking general. She also admits to having aborted a pregnancy that she claims was the result of the rape; it is later revealed that she in fact aborted Frank's child, with his consent. When Gillian Cole (Sandrine Holt), a pregnant former employee, returns to demand health care as part of her severance, Claire says, "I am willing to let your child wither and die inside you, if that's what's required, ... Am I really the sort of enemy you want to make?" In the season finale, she urges Frank to humble himself before President Walker: "Cut out your heart and put it in his fucking hands." The gambit works: Walker resigns, and Frank becomes President, with Claire as First Lady. In season 3, Claire feels the need to be something more "significant" than the First Lady, and asks Frank to nominate her to a United Nations post. He nominates her, but the Senate rejects her after a rocky hearing. Frank gives her the job anyway in a recess appointment, but her tenure is brief; she ruins a treaty between the U.S. and Russia by publicly confronting the Russian president. In season 4, when Frank is shot during a campaign event, Claire privately admits that she feels nothing for him. She works behind the scenes to undermine Frank's election campaign, before finally joining forces with him in order to become his vice president. She also has an affair with her speechwriter Tom Yates (Paul Sparks), with Frank's approval. In season 6, after Frank's death, Claire—now the 47th President—publicly distances herself from him, and privately calls him her "biggest regret". Later in the season, she reveals that she is pregnant with his child.

Reader's Guide

Claire Underwood begins as a lobbyist and CEO of an environmental nonprofit, then ascends to Second Lady, First Lady, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Vice President, and finally the 47th President of the United States. Her relationship with Frank is symbiotic: while Frank is Machiavellian, Claire presents a woman urging on her husband's assertion of power in the image of Lady Macbeth. She encourages his vices while noting her disapproval of his weaknesses, saying: "My husband doesn't apologize ... even to me." Willimon notes that "What's extraordinary about Frank and Claire is there is deep love and mutual respect, but the way they achieve this is by operating on a completely different set of rules than the rest of us typically do." Nancy deWolf Smith of The Wall Street Journal describes Claire as "a short-haired blonde who manages to be masculine and demasculinizing at the same time." Smith describes their relationship as pivotal to the show: "Benign though they may seem—and their harmless air is what makes the Underwoods so effective as political plotters—this is a power couple with the same malignant chemistry as pairs of serial killers, where each needs the other in order to become lethal." In season 3, Claire's marriage to Frank begins to falter. She tires of being in a subordinate role to him, wanting to be "significant" in her own right, and decides that he is "not enough" for her. She leaves him in the season finale but comes back in the fourth season, treating their marriage as a purely political arrangement to further her own career. Prior to Spacey's departure from the series, season 6 was going to center on a divorce battle between Frank and Claire; after Spacey was fired, the season's story arc was drastically rewritten, with Frank dying offscreen and Claire becoming the main character.

Did You Know?

• Robin Wright won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series Drama for this role at the 71st Golden Globe Awards, becoming the first actress to win a Golden Globe Award for a streaming television online-only role in a series.
• She was nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for this role at the 65th, 66th, 67th, 68th, 69th and 71st Primetime Emmy Awards.
• In November 2017, Netflix fired Spacey from the series after a number of people accused him of sexual misconduct; the Frank Underwood character was written out as having died, and Claire became the main character of the show's sixth and final season.
• Following season 4, Robin Wright stated that she felt Claire Underwood was the equal of Frank Underwood and demanded equal pay for her performance; Netflix acquiesced.
• Claire is based on Elizabeth Urquhart from the British miniseries, but unlike the original character, Claire has her own storylines.