Scrapped ‘House of Cards’ Spinoff Opened on Doug Stamper Trying — and Failing — to Kill Himself

For those of us who could not get enough Doug Stamper, we almost got more Doug Stamper.

During an appearance on SiriusXM’s “The Jess Cagle Show with Julia Cunningham,” “House of Cards” star Michael Kelly spoke about the “fricking brilliant” planned Stamper spinoff that never was.

“I had very real conversations with people about a spinoff that was actually fricking brilliant, and I would’ve loved to have done it before everything went away,” Kelly said. “It was a brilliant, brilliant idea for one and it was just like, “Oh my god,” and then it didn’t happen.”

If only “other things” hadn’t “torpedoed” the project. He’s, ah, not so subtly referring to Kevin Spacey blowing the whole thing — including the actual “House of Cards” ending — there.

Spacey has been accused of sexual misconduct by dozens of men; the accusations range in terms of the severity of the alleged behavior. Spacey has denied committing any crimes, though he has admitted to untoward advances.

“I’ve been promiscuous, flirty. I’ve been annoying at times. Definitely persistent,” Spacey said in May when new accusations surfaced. “But I have never, not once, blocked someone from leaving a room or locked the door. I cried once to try to keep somebody in the room. But I’ve never put my arm in front of the door or locked it.”

The only time Spacey has actually been charged with a crime, sexual assault, he was acquitted on all charges.

In the “House of Cards”-verse, Spacey (Frank Underwood) is dead, and it was Doug Stamper who poisoned him.

Stamper did not totally get away with murder in the sense that he got, well, murdered (by Frank’s wife Claire Underwood, played by Robin Wright).

So Doug is dead, which probably means the spinoff would have been a prequel, a la…

“I would’ve loved it ’cause it was a really very, very clever way to spin the show off and they, they wanted to do it kind of like in a “Better Call Saul” way where it had a little bit of comedic, a little bit funnier beats,” Kelly said. “It was gonna start with me trying to kill myself I think, if I remember correctly, in prison and the pipe breaks and he goes back to his cell to find a new cellmate and he’s like, ‘Huh,’ and then it’s really cool. It was really great idea.”

Watch the Kelly interview here: