11 Behind-The-Scenes Facts About Succession

It’s been confirmed that Season 4 will be the last of Succession, but will it be the end for the Roy family? Show creator Jesse Armstrong has kept the door open to creating a spin-off series, either with similar themes or following one of the main characters. Nicholas Braun, who plays Cousin Greg, recently joked to Entertainment Weekly about a “Disgusting Brothers” spin-off, saying, “We go off to Antarctica, and it's just the two of us trying to survive, and then we die pretty quickly. We die after three or four episodes. And that's it.” Even J. Smith Cameron quipped about a spin-off named Gerri! or a show sequel.

But as exciting as it sounds, try not to hold your breath. Casey Bloys, the CEO of HBO and HBO Max, wasn’t as confident. He said to The Wrap in February, “It doesn’t seem to me that there’s something in Succession where you would go, ‘Let’s follow just this kid’ or whatever.”

Patriarch and CEO Logan Roy has said “f*ck off” so many times, fans have made compilations of it. Fans have even approached actor Brian Cox, asking them to say the catchphrase to them. But what does Cox actually think about it? He told CNN in March, “The world truly is crazy. That really convinced me that we’re in such a mess.” Such a Logan response.

Succession was inspired, Screendaily reported in July 2019, by a script Jesse Armstrong wrote about the News of The World scandal in the UK, where the Murdoch family was accused of wiretapping celebrities and politicians for dirt. (It's one of two TV series to be inspired by the real-life drama. The other is Press, which aired on PBS in 2019.) Though rewrites made the Roys less of a direct fictionalization of the Fox News-owning billionaire family, their US network ACN and the Roy's newspaper holdings overseas are still a direct 1:1 to the Murdoch family business.

In March, Jimmy Fallon asked Sarah Snook, who plays Shiv, if the Season 4 promo poster gives any clues about how the episodes will pan out. She confirmed there are subtle Easter eggs in the poster, but added, “You won’t know until you know.”

The show’s actors like Kieran Culkin (Roman) have described a “Will they, won’t they?” feeling when filming season four since no one knew if it was ending or not. Snook told Jimmy Fallon in March the cast didn’t know for sure until the table read for the finale. Way to keep them guessing!

If Logan Roy's miraculous recovery halfway through Season 1 feels a little about-face, that's because it is. The original concept was "The Family Patriarch Dies," leading to the siblings going to war, Cox told The Guardian in 2021. But Cox was so compelling that it was decided having him live would be the more interesting twist. “Everything has to spin off him,” Cox said to The Guardian.

Though the actual office scenes are on a soundstage much of the time, the B-roll footage showing those views out of the windows was shot in some empty office space in One World Trade Center towards the top of the tower, Untapped Cities reported in 2019.

Likewise, Untapped writes that empty condos on Billionaire's Row give Logan Roy's apartment the shots of the Met and Central Park out his windows.

What really makes this show sing is the rapid-fire snippy dialogue between the characters. The show's best moments are when the cast sits down around a dinner table or a makeshift boardroom and lets the verbal knives fly. And the best part is, a ton of it is improvised, executive producer Adam McKay told The Hollywood Reporter in 2019. There's a script, but actors are encouraged to make their own additions as they see fit for their characters. Kendall's breakdown in the pilot episode, for instance, was merely a sketch. Kendall’s infamous “L to the OG” rap was also kept a secret from the rest of the cast, actor Jeremy Strong told Entertainment Weekly in 2019. So if the reactions from the audience seem authentic, they really are.

Culkin was initially asked if he wanted to try for Cousin Greg. But upon reading the script, Culkin told The Hollywood Reporter in 2018, he immediately recognized he was a better fit for the Roy family’s younger brother, Roman. Good call.

The actors’ relationship might be more similar to their characters than you think. Snook told Esquire in March that she and Culkin have a “very sibling relationship.” She recalled that when wrapping filming for Season 4, she teased her on-screen brother, saying, “Hey, Kieran, you’ll love this. When we finish this show, you and I will never work together again.”

But the fam love is real, too. Alan Ruck, who plays Connor, also said to Esquire, “I never had a little brother, and if I could have a little brother, I’d want him to be exactly like Kieran.” Awww.

Speaking of Cousin Greg, the longest, gangliest member of the Roy clan, there's no trickery being pulled, no CGI that goes into that. Braun told Insider he’s actually 6'7" in 2020.