Frank Underwood (House of Cards)

**Francis “Frank” Underwood** also known as Frank Underwood is a fictional character from the Netflix television series _House of Cards_ and was based on Francis Urquhart who was the protagonist of a British show which was also named _House of Cards_. Frank Underwood was played by Kevin Spacey.

## Role in Season One

After Congressman Frank Underwood gets his friend Garett Walker elected President of the United States, Walker breaks his promise to make Frank Underwood Secretary of State, so Frank gets angry and tells his wife Claire Underwood that he will get revenge.  So Frank blackmails a Congressman from Pennsylvania named Peter Russo into working for him and Frank makes an alliance with a reporter named Zoe and has an affair with her that way he can use both Peter and Russo to make sure that everyone knows all of the secrets of the people that Frank wants gone. Frank then convinces Peter to run for Governor of Pennsylvania, kills Peter and makes Peter’s death look like a suicide so that Frank can convince the Vice President to run for Governor of Pennsylvania so that if he wins then President Walker can make Frank Underwood the new Vice President of the United States. Zoe, Zoe’s friend Janine and Zoe’s boyfriend Lucas start to suspect Frank of murder.

## Role in Season Two

Frank Underwood kills Zoe after she asks him if he killed Peter Russo and makes it look like an accident. When Lucas tries to prove that this happened, Frank and his assistant Stamper frame Lucas for Internet terrorism.  Frank frames President Walker for money laundering to get him impeached and Frank takes over as President of the United States.

## Role in Season 3

President Frank Underwood appoints his wife Claire Underwood United States Ambassador to the United Nations but fires her after she publicly criticizes the homophobic laws in Russia. Frank says that he will run for President of the United States in 2016 and will destroy unemployment with a law called AmWorks. Claire tells Frank she wants to divorce him.

## Role in Season 4

Frank is trying to convince the Democratic Party of the United States to let him run for President but then his wife Claire Underwood sends the Internet a black and white photograph of Frank’s father Calvin taking a loan from the Ku Klux Klan and a picture of Frank going to an American Civil War re-enactment with someone dressed as a Confederate soldier. Claire tells Frank she’ll stop if he makes her Vice President, Frank says no. Then Lucas shoots Frank and is killed by the Secret Service but Frank survives and apologizes to Claire. Frank tries to use the NSA to rig the election but when an actual terrorist group shows up he can’t do that anymore so instead he decides to tell the American people to be scared because “I can sell fear”.

## Role in Season 5

After the election ends in a tie between Frank and a Republican Governor named Will Conway, Frank and Claire decide to have Kentucky be the tie-breaking vote so Frank shows a recording of Conway having a nervous breakdown and another recording of Conway’s running mate saying he wanted to kill Frank. Ex-President Garett Walker says he knew about the money laundering when he was President and that it was actually Frank’s idea. Congress starts trying to impeach Frank while a journalist named Tom Hammerschidt suspects that Frank killed Zoe so Frank frames his assistant Douglas Stamper. Frank also confesses to the money laundering and quits being president so that his Vice President Claire Underwood can give him a pardon but then she doesn’t.

## Role in Season 6

Frank Underwood doesn’t appear in the sixth season because Kevin Spacey was fired. The show says that Frank died but doesn’t say how until the last episode. Frank had wanted to kill Claire Underwood for not pardoning him so Frank’s assistant Stamper killed Frank because he didn’t want murder to be what people remembered about Frank.

## Infobox (character)

- **name**: Frank Underwood
- **series**: House of Cards (American TV series), House of Cards
- **caption**: Kevin Spacey as Frank Underwood
- **first**: "Chapter 1 (House of Cards), Chapter 1"
February 1, 2013
- **last**: "Chapter 65" (official)
May 30, 2017
"Chapter 66" (stand-in)
November 2, 2018
- **creator**: Beau Willimon
- **portrayer**: Kevin Spacey
Uncredited stand-in (season 6)
- **full name**: Francis Joseph Underwood
- **occupation**: Member of the South Carolina Senate
 (1985-1991)
 Member of the United States House of Representatives, U.S. House of Representatives from South Carolina's 5th congressional district
 (1991-2013)
 Party leaders of the United States House of Representatives, Majority Whip of the United States House of Representatives
 (2005-2013)
 Vice President of the United States
 (2013–2014)
 President of the United States
 (2014–2017)
 Second Gentleman of the United States
(2017)
 Senior Advisor to the President of the United States, Special Advisor to the President
 (2017)
 First Gentleman of the United States
(2017)
- **family**: Calvin T. Underwood (father)
Catherine Underwood (mother)
- **title**: President of the United States
- **religion**: Atheism (de facto)
 Christianity (de jure)
- **nationality**: American
- **lbl21**: Party
- **data21**: Democratic Party (United States), Democratic
- **lbl22**: Hometown
- **data22**: Gaffney, South Carolina
- **lbl23**: Alma mater
- **data23**: The Citadel, The Military College of South Carolina, The Sentinel (BA, 1981)
Harvard Law School (JD, 1984)
- **lbl24**: Based on
- **data24**: Francis Urquhart