‘House of Cards’ on Netflix Stars Kevin Spacey

There are two natural showcases for envy, ambition and the pettier yearnings of the human heart — high school and Washington. Everybody remembers 10th grade, and most people think they know what’s really going on in the federal government.

Public servants, after all, do their service in public. Loan officers, law partners and computer programmers may well flatter, scheme and deceive at the workplace as much as any member of Congress, but they aren’t on C-Span, and their day-to-day obstacles and temptations are more obscure. A high school comedy has jocks and cheerleaders. A Washington comedy has senators and senior White House aides.

“House of Cards” is a new series on Netflix that revels in the familiar but always entertaining underbelly of government. And, actually, this particular story has been told before: it’s a clever American adaptation of a popular BBC series by the same name that starred Ian Richardson as a conniving member of Parliament in the early 1990s.

The American version stars Kevin Spacey as Francis Underwood, a South Carolina congressman and power broker who expects to be rewarded by the president-elect with a high-level cabinet post. When the job is offered to someone else, Francis plots slow-release revenge and his own advancement, explaining himself in conspiratorial asides to the audience like Shakespeare’s Richard III. It’s a role that comes almost too easily to Mr. Spacey, who not long ago starred in “Richard III” at the Brooklyn Academy of Music and played the crooked Washington lobbyist Jack Abramoff in the movie “Casino Jack.”

The novelty of “House of Cards” lies less with its themes than with its delivery system: Netflix, which has more than 27 million subscribers to its streaming service in the United States, hopes to compete with premium cable networks like HBO and Showtime by offering its own original programming. On Friday Netflix will release all 13 episodes of the show, calculating that many of its customers prefer to watch their favorite series in supersize marathon sessions.

“House of Cards,” however, is probably seen best one episode at a time. It’s a delicious immorality play with an excellent cast, but the tempo is slow and oddly ponderous — a romp slowed down to a dirge.

Mr. Spacey is always compelling and perhaps to his credit he doesn’t ham it up the way he did in “Richard III” or the way Mr. Richardson did in the BBC version. There is nothing playful or campy in his villainy. Francis stares into the camera with a deep, depressed anger that fuels his sneering cynicism.

Unfortunately Mr. Spacey’s lines don’t always live up to the subtle power of his performance; the writing isn’t Shakespeare, or even Aaron Sorkin, and at times, it turns strangely trite. “After 22 years in Congress I can smell which way the wind is blowing,” he tells the camera. Actually, in that instance, he didn’t see it coming.

Robin Wright plays Claire, Francis’s wife, a Lady Macbeth in jogging outfits who coolly stokes her husband’s ambitions while misusing her charitable foundation to fulfill her own. Claire applauds all his vices except weakness. “My husband doesn’t apologize,” she tells him, “even to me.”

Francis has other accomplices, some willing, others unwitting. He makes fiendish use of Zoe Barnes (Kate Mara), a young reporter at The Washington Herald who has no scruples or ethics and aspires to having her own blog. She begs Francis to be her source and promises not only to protect his identity but also to print whatever he tells her and not to “ask any questions.”

For some reason, possibly related to the real-life notoriety of Ana Marie Cox, the founding editor of the gossipy political Web site Wonkette, the blogger-fatale has become a staple of Washington tales, including the recent USA mini-series “Political Animals.” (In that show the veteran newspaper columnist complains about a sexy, young upstart by saying that these days Eve Harrington “would bake cupcakes and write a blog.”) Zoe, who dons push-up bras and V-neck shirts for interviews, should probably call her blog Bonkette.

Francis has several other henchmen under his command, and with their help he thrives as a master manipulator, smiling at his enemies and backslapping the colleagues and rivals that he undermines and sets up for destruction.

There aren’t a lot of new twists in “House of Cards.” Instead there is pleasure in watching Francis seem a saint while mostly he plays the devil.

House of Cards

Available for streaming on Netflix on Friday at 3 a.m., Eastern time; 2 a.m., Central time; midnight, Pacific time.

Produced by Donen/Fincher/Roth and Trigger Street Productions in association with Media Rights Capital for Netflix. Episodes 1 and 2 directed by David Fincher; written by Beau Willimon; created for television by Mr. Willimon, based on the novels by Michael Dobbs and the mini-series by Andrew Davies; Mr. Fincher, Mr. Willimon, Joshua Donen, Eric Roth, Kevin Spacey, Dana Brunetti, Mr. Davies, Mr. Dobbs and John Melfi, executive producers; Sarah Treem and Rick Cleveland, co-executive producers; Keith Huff and Karyn McCarthy, producers.

WITH: Kevin Spacey (Francis Underwood), Robin Wright (Claire Underwood), Kate Mara (Zoe Barnes), Corey Stoll (Patrick Russo), Michael Kelly (Doug Stamper), Sakina Jaffrey (Linda Vasquez) and Kristen Connolly (Christina Gallagher).