Peter Kramer/HBOSo that Succession Season 2 finale was crazy, huh? You should probably make sure you’ve seen it before reading the rest of this.
As the astronomically rich, ginormously powerful and majorly unscrupulous Roy family returns for Season 3 (HBO Sundays at 9pm ET/PT beginning Oct. 17), it’s all-out war between Kendall (Jeremy Strong) and his father, Logan (Brian Cox). After Logan picked Kendall to take the fall for Waystar Royco’s cruise-line scandal, Kendall instead used his mea culpa press conference to tell the world (and fed-up stockholders) that his father is “a malignant presence, a bully and a liar” who knew all about the under-the-table settlements and coverups.
It’s been two years since that episode dropped, and the COVID-19 pandemic was to blame for delaying the start of Season 3 production in New York until late 2020. Then the cast was off to very lovely but very hot Tuscany over the summer to film the season’s final two episodes. “When you make a show about extremely wealthy people, you get to go to some very nice places,” says Alan Ruck, who plays Connor, the eldest, oddest Roy sibling.
Fortunately for Connor, his complete disinterest in the family business might shield him from the crossfire to come. “The show is called Succession, it’s not called Connor’s Progress,” Ruck says. “I think early on Connor realized he had no aptitude for the business world, so when the show is strictly dealing with problems of Waystar Royco, Connor is probably not going to be involved.”
Connor’s more into bankrolling his girlfriend’s terrible Broadway play, bidding big money on fake Napoleon artifacts and running a ludicrous campaign for president of the United States. Those are the types of hobbies the Roy family can afford.
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They also have the privilege of avoiding a global outbreak of a deadly disease, which is a concern of the great unwashed. Season 3 was written before the pandemic, and it made sense not to update the storylines to include it. “There are people in the world who kind of walk between the raindrops, and the Roys are a member of that group,” Ruck says. “I do think that some — many, probably — of the world’s wealthiest people were not affected by COVID in much of any way. Because it’s like, ‘Oh, this is annoying! We’ll just go to our island, or that fabulous country home. We’ll go wherever the disease isn’t, in our private planes.’”
