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A SUPER EDITOR’S CHOICE
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In the summer of 2018, HBO steamed a TV series blockbuster, Succession (2018-2023). The first season got three nominations at the 2019 Emmys and won in the category of outstanding writing for a drama series at the 71st Primetime Emmy Awards.
The story of Succession revolves around a family. This is not an ordinary family, but one of the richest families in the world.
The patriarch Logan Roy single-handedly founded the media empire Waystar RoyCo. In terms of scale alone, Waystar RoyCo's setting is equivalent to the previous News Corporation or the current Disney.
These two super media giants are also important templates for Succession. These two media giants will be mentioned later in the article. The specific references in the series will be mentioned later.
Back to Logan Roy and his Roy family. In the first episode, the old Logan is slowly stepping down from the position of CEO of the family-owned media conglomerate due to his physical reasons, and the company is gradually handed over to his son Kendall Roy. However, at Logan’s 80th birthday party, when Kendall was officially announced as the CEO of the group, Logan suddenly withdraws the decision and continues to serve as the CEO of the group, regaining power.
As a son of Logan, Kendall was unprepared. He believed that his father, who had been too strict with him since he was a child, did not trust him and felt betrayed by his father.
At the same time, Logan also intends to give his new wife Marcia a place in the family trust. This is even more unacceptable to Roy's 4 children, the eldest son Connor, Kendall, the younger son Roman and daughter Siobhan. A battle of succession kicks off.
Some of the audiences may be wondering, people have seen too many old-fashioned stories such as infighting among wealthy families and inheritance, what makes this American drama Succession different?
First of all, at the shallowest level, there is an A-Team crew for the series.
In the director lineup, the leading Adam McKay directed The Big Short (2015) and Vice (2018), which were consecutively nominated for Oscar best picture. In addition to McKay, there are two other powerful TV directors, one is Mark Mylod, who directed 6 episodes of Game of Thrones and is also a screenwriter. Another is Adam Arkin, who directed and played Fargo, Arkin is also the producer of Succession. There’s also Rupert Murdoch, a British drama developer, who is also the screenwriter of the first season of Black Mirror.
The leading actor, Brian Cox, is a famous British actor. Cox spans movies and TV series, he is the earliest actor who played Hannibal in Manhunter (1986) and has participated in countless Hollywood commercial blockbusters, such as X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014), The Bourne Ultimatum (2004, 2007), Troy (2004) and so on. In the TV field, although Cox only won 1 Emmy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Nuremberg (2000), his profound stage performance skills are well known. Cox tends to play the most prestigious roles on the show. In Succession, Cox played the mature, sophisticated and scheming Logan Roy.
With Brian Cox at the core of the cast, other leads, Jeremy Strong as Kendall, Sarah Snook as daughter Siobhan and Kieran Culkin as Roman, all contribute stunning performances.
Secondly, the stories in Succession are based on real stories of real wealthy families.
Most directly, the Waystar RoyCo conglomerate shadows Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Logan Roy is directly derived from Rupert Murdoch. In fact, before reporting the Succession project to HBO, Jesse Armstrong once wrote a biopic script with Murdoch as the protagonist, the name is "Murdoch", and this script was also blacklisted in Hollywood.
This script is about a day of Murdoch’s, and this day is his 78th birthday. On this day, Murdoch asked his four children to sign an agreement allowing him to change the family trust to include his new wife Wendi Deng Murdoch. Wendi Deng's participation in the inheritance of the family estate made it unacceptable to the children, which directly ignited the fuse between Murdoch and the children.
This story of the Murdoch family is exactly the same as the content of the first episode of Succession.
Later, this project named "Murdoch" for some unknown reason (or a well-known reason), fell to nothing.
It has been rumoured that the relationship between Murdoch and his children is very tense, especially with three of them, sons Lachlan and James, and daughter Elisabeth.
Biographical author Michael Wolff wrote a biography of Murdoch in 2008 called "The Man Who Owns the News: Inside the Secret World of Rupert Murdoch". In the book, he disclosed that Murdoch's strongest desire is for his children can inherit his business, but the biggest paradox is here: He thinks no child is qualified to inherit.
Lachlan Murdoch was originally the first heir to News Corp. As early as 1995, he was already the deputy chief executive. By 2000, Lachlan Murdoch had become Senior Vice President. But in 2005, he resigned as News Corp's deputy chief operating officer because of a feud with his father. It is said that the main reason is that although Lachlan is the successor of the group in name, the actual situation is that Rupert Murdoch has been unwilling to delegate power, not to mention cutting Lachlan’s position, and not allowing Lachlan to enter the core business of the group. For this reason, Lachlan Murdoch left News Corporation for many years.
After returning, Lachlan became the CEO of 20th Century Fox. "Coincidentally", Logan in Succession also "persuaded" Kendall with good words. He said to Kendall, "How about the boss of a TV network?"
This is no coincidence, of course, as Lachlan Murdoch is the prototype for Kendall Roy in Succession.
Another son of the Murdoch family, James Murdoch, is the prototype of Roman Roy.
Like James in real life, Roman initially devoted himself to the entertainment industry. As the third son of the Roy Family, he has endless money. He invests in movies and works as a producer. Roman is constantly trying to show off his talents and presence, but the truth is, no one really takes him seriously.
According to Michael Wolff, many people also think that James Murdoch is just a clown. Even the colleagues who had worked with him at the beginning said that the reason why they would cooperate with James was nothing more than the name Murdoch. A gossip is that the name "Roman" is derived from the fact that James Murdoch lived in Rome in his early years.
However, Succession is not just a Murdoch biography. Jesse Armstrong also constantly emphasized in interviews that Murdoch is just a leverage point for the series. There are full of secrets about the top rich people of more than just the Murdoch family…
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Money, War and the “Murdochs”: ‘Succession’ Season 1 Review (2/2)
Caught in Scandal: ‘Succession’ Season 2 Review (1/2)
Caught in Scandal: ‘Succession’ Season 2 Review (2/2)
The Next Level of Excellence: ‘Succession’ Season 3 Review
-TBC-
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