You talk about love?
Dad, why?
Why?
Because it works.
We tune into Succession each week
to get a look at the Roy family,
in part, because it gives us a chance to say,
Well, our family’s not quite that messed up,
or, Hey I know that, that’s my family.
Hey GQ, It’s Dr. Eric Bender again.
I’m back to talk about Succession
and some of the characters in the show.
[upbeat music]Logan Roy.
When you talk about Succession,
you have to start with Logan Roy.
He would have it no other way.
In the first episode of the season,
he’s showing some signs of illness,
and suddenly, there’s this fight among his kids
to see who is gonna take over the corporation.
If you actually look at the theme song though,
that’s where we see the very first images of him.
We see these children that are dressed up,
they’re playing tennis, they’re doing all kinds of things,
but if you notice, they’re alone.
The father’s in the distance,
he’s walking through a field.
Or even at the table,
he’s at the head, at a distance.
That’s very common
and that’s what is the unifying theme here for all the kids,
that their father is not present, he’s not with them.
It’s a pleasure to have you here tonight
to honor my dad’s life and work.
[audience applauding]When his son introduces Logan,
Kendall says, Here we are to celebrate my dad,
and the camera pans to Logan, he’s alone,
he’s at a table all by himself.
Logan’s complex in that he is a narcissist.
So what narcissism is,
if you go by a psychological or psychiatric definition,
includes someone who feels that they’re special,
they pursue power, beauty, wealth.
Kids don’t really fit into that,
except in how can they help him do that, and they can’t.
A narcissistic parent will often use fear-based tactics
to scare kids into doing what the parent wants
or to just make them feel they won’t be loved
unless they do exactly what they’re told.
There’s an intolerance for disobedience.
There’s also gaslighting,
which is a term you might have heard
that means someone will say, That didn’t happen,
when it actually did.
And what I’ve decided I’d like to do
is to formally ask you to come in
and be the next Chief Executive of this company.
I don’t think I’m the right person.
Well, you know, I’m pretty smart and I think you are.
Some example of gaslighting here would be
in the conversation that Logan has with Shiv saying,
You’re the one,
you’re the one who’s gonna take this to the next level.
Yet, in the future,
every time she tries to get him to say that,
he almost pretends it never happened.
It’s been discussed,
but I don’t think we’re quite at the point where-
No, not anytime soon.
We’ve discussed the transition and some arrangements.
We won’t bore you.
[Shiv] [laughs] No.There’s gonna be a point at which
he’s just not gonna gonna be in control,
and that is incredibly threatening to a narcissist.
Underneath the narcissism is an incredibly fragile person.
Kids pick up on this in some way,
usually when they’re younger,
and they realize, Oh we can’t say that, we can’t do that,
we can’t behave this way
because it will really hurt this parent
and something awful is gonna happen.
That’s why it’s really important to start with Logan
because everything that happens and unfolds
is because of him and because of his narcissism.
Kendall Roy.
Kendall is one of Logan’s sons
and he’s really lacking self-confidence.
He’s someone that has responded to this world
without a present father by escaping it
and pursuing drugs, substances.
He doesn’t know how
to have a relationship with other people.
And that’s true for all of these kids.
They don’t know how to interact
with people the way they should,
because they were never shown how to do that,
both by the father, as well as by the mother.
When you talk about Kendall, he’s already been married
and divorced or separated at this point.
He’s this strange figure to his kids.
They’re present when he’s on a trip to Italy,
but they’re not really interacting with him
in very meaningful ways.
Hello darlings. How are you?
How lovely to see you. [laughs]
Don’t you look lovely?
So you’re all going to be taken up to the house.
[Caroline speaking foreign language] [Kendall] I’ll be there in a minute, guys.Sometimes when someone who hasn’t been given
lots of care and love,
when they are offered something,
they really do dive right in.
They really try to pursue it.
They want more of it, it’s overstimulating,
’cause they’ve sought it.
So you’ll see him overreact to something
or jump into a relationship
when there’s no basis for a relationship there.
All right, so what are we gonna do here?
I feel like we should maybe buy an island,
put in a giant island-sized bed and just make love all day.
You ever been to Dundee?
You wanna come to Dundee?
One of the most heartbreaking scenes,
even though it doesn’t look heartbreaking at first,
is when Kendall goes in and guts Walter.
Hey! Hey!
Kendall. What the [beep] are you doing?
The [beep] is going on?
Yeah, sorry about the cloak and dagger.
I just needed some time to untangle all your [beep].
Find the profit centers, keep the union off our back.
We’re already fully operational on seven.
Why?
Because my dad told me to.
With Kendall, there is this push and pull,
rebel against the father, side with him,
rebel against father, side with him.
I think each kid has that,
but Kendall makes an attempt to overthrow his father,
say there’s a vote of no confidence,
or later, to, on the news, live, say,
His reign ends now,
he allowed all these illegal operations to happen.
But the interesting thing is, it’s always a push and pull
and it’s either always the father getting what he wants
or Kendall feels like it’s always what he would want.
There’s no in between, there’s no sharing
because there was no sharing.
A narcissistic parent takes up all the room
and all the space.
There is no place for anyone else.
Siobhan Roy.
Defend dad all you want, but Gerri can look after herself.
Yeah, I know that, I’m not defending Gerri, I’m saying-
[Siobhan] You can’t hide under the covers with mommy.Oh, [beep] off, Siobhan.
Oh, you love showing your peepee to everyone,
but someday, you know,
you’re actually gonna have to [beep] something.
The relationship that Shiv has with her brothers
and that they have with her is one of competition.
And that’s a result of the parenting, too.
It’s pitting one kid against the other.
We see that in her marriage to Tom.
She doesn’t wanna talk about kids.
She doesn’t wanna talk about his fears of going to prison.
She just wants him there when she wants him
and doesn’t want him there when she doesn’t want him there.
Talk to him in Hungary.
What?
Yeah.
I don’t think I wanna do that, Shiv.
Uh, oh, hello?
Is this the Replica Department?
Yeah, my meat puppet has stopped working.
Shiv, Shiv.
When we talk about Shiv, I think it’s important
to mention the relationship she has with her mother.
I don’t think I’ve ever won a single battle
in my whole life.
I was ten, mom.
It was a [beep] kid.
It was were 13.
And you knew how to twist the knife,
you knew then, and you know now.
And I might cry.
Oh, yeah? Where’s the onion?
I mean, I don’t understand what a kid
is supposed to do with that,
even as an adult, do you go back and redo your childhood?
I mean, that’s ridiculous.
Roman Roy.
I’d lay you badly, but I’d lay you gladly.
Can I remind you, Roman, that so far as I’m concerned,
nothing has ever happened between us
other than of a professional nature.
Mhm. Gotta be curious though, right?
A young fighter in his prime.
Technically raw, but you know, hungry.
If you were to ask Shiv and Kendall, and even Connor,
they probably look at Roman and say,
Oh, he’s the youngest child, he’s the baby.
Stereotypically, people often look at the baby
as the one that gets away with anything.
Roman’s relationship with Gerri is pretty interesting.
He gets turned on when she degrades him.
Not to sound too much like a psychiatrist,
but one reason this might be is because of mother issues.
Now it’s degrading,
it’s humiliation that she offers him,
but there’s a little bit of a power dynamic here
in the sexual excitement.
It could be that he has been so degraded
by his father over time,
to make its sexual and to get something out of it,
he’s taking control of it.
Okay, I’m very sorry, Gerri.
No, you don’t get to speak.
You have always been a disappointment, but this is just,
you have gone beyond the pale.
I have?
Oh, yeah.
I think his lack of self-confidence though,
shows whenever he has a chance
to be in control of something,
he really wants the opportunity,
but he also completely fails.
Roman is also an interesting one to talk about
because of his name.
Sometimes Logan refers to him as Romulus.
So Romulus and Remus, the twins,
were both suckled by a wolf.
Very interesting to compare Logan to a wolf,
but the other point here is that Romulus succeeded.
He beat Remus, Rome was named Rome.
There’s this hope that Roman will do that,
I mean, there’s a lot in a name.
Roman can’t do any of that.
He can barely even say,
Yeah, I don’t want my dad here anymore,
I’m voting no confidence, he can’t say it.
He’s shrinking down in his chair, literally,
and the father just bulldozes over him.
Connor Roy.
Hey. Oh, wonderful.
What is it?
[Connor] Well-Oh yes, yes. It’s a goo.
It’s a [beep] goo.
It’s perfect.
It’s sourdough starter.
Connor is delusional.
That’s his way of dealing with a life
where he does not have the love from his father.
But Connor focuses on things that really are not possible.
Hey! The butter’s too cold!
The butter is too cold!
The butter’s all [beep].
Now you’re [beep] watching you [beep].
There’s dinner rolls ripping out there
as we speak! Connor! Connor!
I am a laughing stock! Connor!
There are always issues when you serve this many people,
but I think, on the whole, it’s going very well.
Complacent. You’re fired!
You’re all fired! Idiots!
He focuses on these things
that really are inconsequential.
He doesn’t have a basis for reality.
He’s not psychotic, he’s not having a break from reality,
he’s not hearing things or seeing things,
he’s just delusional.
He thinks he’s gonna be President of the United States.
He’s not really held a job.
One thing that parents who are narcissistic
often end up imparting on their kids
is that relationships are transactional.
Connor’s got this in his life,
in his relationship with Willa.
Willa is essentially a call girl,
and that person becomes his girlfriend.
But over time, you know, he wants to marry her.
Again, he’s detached from the reality here
that she probably doesn’t wanna marry him at all.
And then he gets offended.
This is his own narcissism coming out,
he gets offended that she doesn’t necessarily
have an answer for him when he says
that he wants to marry her.
[beep] it.Come on, how bad can it be, right?
Really?
Yeah, why not? You know, we’ll have fun.
I don’t know many people
that would want to marry someone who says,
Sure, [beep] it, I’ll spend the rest of my life with you.
But that’s what she does.
So in some ways, he’s okay with that,
’cause it’s a transaction.
He’s asked her to marry him.
He will provide, she will be with him.
Tom Wambsgans.
So moving outside of the immediate family,
you have Tom Wambsgans, who ends up becoming Shiv’s husband.
Tom seems to be this almost milk toast kinda guy
who just follows Shiv around,
literally follows her towards the bathroom
when she’s visiting her father in the hospital and proposes.
There’s something I have to say to you.
What? Siobhan Roy-
Oh my God.
Will you marry me?
What the [beep]? Seriously?
I love you,
and I wanted to do something to make all this better.
And I thought, while your dad’s still with us,
wouldn’t that be a nice thing?
We can get a quick wedding.
What is it about my dad dying in a sterile environment
that screams big romantic gesture to you?
But what’s interesting about Tom, this outside person,
is he does express his emotion, he does express,
I really love you, I want to have you as my wife.
He does express, I don’t wanna be in prison,
he does express fear.
And again, it’s met with nothing,
’cause the Roy family doesn’t know how
to respond to emotion.
Tom’s been mistreated.
So when he gets a chance to mistreat other people,
he takes that.
Whereas, some people might say,
You know, that feels really terrible
when people do that to me.
I’m not gonna do that to anyone else.
Tom’s a Roy now.
Anyone I talk to, I effectively kill.
Here.
That’s the death pit, Greg.
Take a look.
I mean, I feel like I might not like it in the death pit.
Go ahead.
The invitation to the death pit is one Greg does not want,
but he does it anyway.
He is somewhat forced to do it,
but then he realizes this is really bad,
how can I distance myself from this enough,
so he steals some pages.
He doesn’t want to do this to other people,
he doesn’t wanna be a part of this.
Tom might be doing some of the things he does,
also to endear himself to Shiv
who functions in that way,
that ruthless, cunning way.
He can’t get close to her emotionally,
so maybe this is the next thing, and then she’ll like him.
Cousin Greg.
I’m actually here to see you.
Whoa, whoa, whoa!
Back off!
[Greg grunting] Who are you? What you doing?I’m Greg. I’m Greg.
I’m Marian’s Greg, your nephew.
When I was looking at Greg
to really try to understand his psychology,
I found that I didn’t have a ton to talk about,
which I think is really a reflection
of his experience in the family, he’s just there.
Greg’s introduction in the show is very interesting.
He’s in this costume, he’s just smoked,
and he ends up vomiting all through the costume,
through the eyes, through the mouth,
around all these children who are at the theme park.
It’s somewhat indicative of his role in the family.
He’s this character
and people don’t know really what to make of him.
What do you make of a vomiting, walking, Muppet?
The other thing about Greg
that’s important to mention is he’s the most human.
He’s the most relatable for a lot of people,
because you do see him face these situations,
almost as we do, the way audience members do,
and think, What do I do with this?
How do I respond to this?
And that’s what we’re doing while we view the show,
that’s what Greg’s doing in real-time
as he sees this family.
So he sees the trappings of this family
and isn’t sure that he really wants to be a part of it.
And even though he comes across as this oafy kinda guy,
but Cousin Greg is not as goofy as you think he is.
Something I sometimes say to people I work with
and see in therapy,
particularly to parents,
if I’m seeing their children will be,
If your child feels at all the way I do,
and I’m only feeling this for a few minutes,
‘we really need to work
on how you communicate with your kid.
So you can learn a lot from the feelings you get
when you’re sitting with people.
When I sit and watch Succession,
I really enjoy the episode, but I’m ready for time to be up.
So I think people like to know, okay,
I can get close to this really horrible,
dysfunctional thing, but I can pull back.
So there’s a way to look at what might be scary to us,
thinking our family doesn’t work, that nobody loves us,
and yet, we can withdraw from it
by turning the TV off at any point.
