HBO’s Succession and the Classics

Succession, the HBO series about the ruthless dynamics of a media empire, has been hailed as one of the defining television dramas of recent years. Part of what gives the series its depth is its subtle usage of classical references. But how should we understand these allusions to antiquity – and what do they add to its portrayal of power, politics, and family?

Roys and Romans

Logan Roy, authoritarian pater familias and boss of Fox News-esque media conglomerate Waystar RoyCo, is visiting the left-intellectual Pierce family. He raises a toast: ‘Like Romans among the Greeks. I’m sure you find us all rather, you know, big, vulgar, and boisterous.’ It is not the only moment in the series where the Roys are cast as Romans. Son-in-law Tom Wambsgans reads a history book about the Romans, Uncle Ewan quotes Tacitus, and Logan systematically calls his son Roman ‘Romulus’. What are we to make of this parallel?

First, it comments upon the character of the Roy family. Like Romans, they present themselves as macho, imperialistic, and self-consciously uncultured – and thus distance themselves from cultivated types like the Greeks. Vice President Frank Vernon, one of the (relatively) more upright characters in the series, is repeatedly put in his place by Logan for spreading classic quotes: ‘Why don’t you take your library card and fuck off?’ In their ruthless conquest of the media and entertainment landscape, the Roys brutalize all nuance and culture: Rome conquers Greece – although the Romans themselves saw it differently, as evidenced by the poet Horace’s claim that conquered Greece paradoxically took over Rome along with its culture (Letter 2.1).

Falling Empires

Besides a critique of the increasing superficiality of American cultural and news coverage, the Roys-Romans parallel also implies a warning: after all, the Roman Empire did fall. Succession alludes to this repeatedly. Logan’s son Kendall calls Waystar ‘a declining empire inside a declining empire’, an allusion to the demise of ‘old’ media – Waystar, like Fox, is primarily big in news and television – and to the waning position of the US on the world stage. In the final season, the company is indeed threatened with a takeover by Swedish tech millionaire Lukas Matsson, who is constantly labeled a ‘Viking’ by the Roys. In historical reality, the Vikings did not appear on the world stage until the eighth century, but Matsson clearly represents the role of the northern peoples generally known as the ‘barbarians’ who brought down the Roman Empire.

In any case, in Succession (and in most popular films and series), one should not interpret classical references as a one-to-one model for how the plot will develop. Not every parallel is worked out down to the last detail, and multiple (classical or otherwise) layers can exist on top of one another. For instance, the Roman layer is supplemented by an explicit reference to the empire of Alexander the Great. In ‘Mass in Time of War’ (season 3, episode 2), Kendall pitches a plan to his brothers and sister to divide their father’s company among themselves: ‘We’re looking at 323 BC, basically. […] Alexander is dead. I take Asia, you take Egypt, Shiv takes Europe, Con – the rest of the world.’ The comparison emphasizes the role of the ‘fourth wheel’ on the tricycle that brother Connor plays throughout the series. Alexander’s empire was divided into three parts, after all, so the ‘rest’ amounts to absolutely nothing. But the comparison also reflects ironically on Kendall’s plan itself: the tripartite division brought a definitive end to the greatest empire the Greek world has ever known.

Succession Issues

The Alexander parallel brings us to what is obviously the most important theme of the series: the notion of succession itself. After Alexander's sudden death, a major debate arose among his generals regarding whom he had wanted as his successor. According to the Greek author Diodorus Siculus (17.117), he gave his ring to Perdiccas on his deathbed, but his final words – ‘τῷ κρατίστῳ’, ‘to the strongest’ – could also be interpreted as the election of his general ‘Craterus,’ or as a general call to the strongest general to take over (for the name ‘Craterus’ also means ‘the strongest’). Thus, every general could put his own spin on Alexander’s wishes, resulting in a fierce and destructive power struggle.

In Succession, too, Logan's three children (without Connor, who indeed remains out of contention throughout) constantly squabble over the question of whom their father actually sees as his ideal successor. In addition to the Alexander analogy, we can also read a Roman parallel here. Tacitus (who is briefly mentioned in the series by Uncle Ewan) describes the problematic succession of Emperor Augustus in his Annals (1.3). Several candidates are successively put forward by Augustus, but through their natural death, ‘or,’ in Tacitus’ famous phrasing, ‘through a ruse by their stepmother Livia’, they drop out one by one, until finally Livia’s son (and Augustus’ second choice) Tiberius takes over.

Appearance and reality

In Succession, Marcia, Logan’s wife and stepmother to the children, indeed emerges as an I, Claudius-like Livia, who secretly manipulates her husband to sideline her stepchildren. But the main point of comparison with Tacitus lies in the constant emphasis on behind-the-scenes power games in general. Tacitus’ subtle ‘or through a ruse by their stepmother Livia’ phrase thematizes the discrepancy between appearance and reality he sees in the empire. On the surface, Livia was a loving wife, but behind the scenes, on Tacitus’ view, she was a schemer who may well have poisoned her stepchildren. In name, Rome was still a Republic; in practice, a dictatorship. In the Senate, the senators incessantly praised the emperor; outside, they secretly plotted his death.

The same is true in Succession, where seemingly grand expressions of love are made purely out of personal gain. Daughter Shiv feigns love for her husband Tom in private, only to publicly abandon him time and again whenever it suits her. The two brothers, Roman and Kendall, regularly give each other a big hug, but fight behind each other's backs for the favor and succession to their father. (The association with the name ‘Romulus’ undoubtedly play a role here; in some versions of the story, he murders his brother Remus to become king.) And Logan himself, in the rare moments that he shows any affection for his children, does so only because he wants to prevent them from getting in his way professionally.

Oedipus Complexes

The strained relationship between Logan and his children is complemented in the series by another classical model: Oedipus. The tragic figure, iconically portrayed in Sophocles’ Oedipus Tyrannus, who accidentally murders his father and subsequently marries his mother, has become embedded in our cultural consciousness primarily through Freud’s theory of the Oedipus complex. Every human being, the psychoanalyst argues, unconsciously regards the parent of the same sex as a competitor, while actually longing for the love of the parent of the opposite sex. In short, just like Oedipus, every man wants to take over his father’s position (and every woman that of her mother).

The Oedipus theme is all over Succession. Roman, the youngest son, constantly fantasizes about sex with the mother figures in his life. Shiv, on the other hand, experiences intense rivalry with her (real) mother. Kendall, even more than the other children, want to take over his father’s position, but mostly seeks his recognition. When Roman and Kendall hatch a plan to force their father out of the company, a Waystar board member remarks: ‘You and Kendall are thinking of killing your dad? Well, that’s a little Greek tragedy.’ His partner adds: ‘Yeah, Oedipus.’

Although the Oedipus layer is primarily present through the filter of Freud, there is definitely something classically tragic about it: the children are desperately seeking their father’s recognition, but cannot obtain it by dancing to his tune (Logan then considers them weak), nor by rebelling against him (Logan then forces them back into line, often by making them feel guilty). In turn, Logan might well want his children to take over the company, but he is repeatedly disappointed by their obsessive tendency to seek his approval, rather than coming up with their own ideas and taking responsibility themselves – a tendency he himself instilled in them by treating them lovelessly from a young age.

Nero and his slaves

The tragic-Oedipal relationship between Logan and his children thus resembles a Hegelian master-slave dynamic. A final classical reference in the series suggests that we should also view this at the level of the company itself. In ‘Lion in the Meadow’ (season 3, episode 4), son-in-law Tom tells an anecdote to his protégé Greg, with whom he has a half-bromance, half-bullying relationship. ‘Sporus was a young slave boy, he was Nero’s favourite. […] Nero pushed his wife down the stairs. Then he had Sporus castrated, and he married him instead, and he gave him a ring, and made him dress up like his dead wife.’

This anecdote from Suetonius’ Life of Nero (28) is clearly meant to confirm Greg’s subordinate position – and to emphasize for us as viewers that Tom uses Greg to vent the frustrations he feels about his own wife Shiv. On a more abstract level, the anecdote also thematizes the striking subservience of Waystar's employees. Greg may be Tom's Sporus, but Tom himself constantly sucks up to Logan. The message – which Suetonius and Tacitus would likely endorse – is that the dictatorial leadership structure of the (media) empire, headed by the Augustus-like Logan, inevitably turns all employees into yes-men, just as happened with the senators in Rome. And those employees, just like Logan's recognition-seeking children themselves, turn out to be bad employees: irresponsible suck-ups, uncreative approval seekers, and little tyrants towards their own subordinates.

Thus, the Oedipal tragedy of Logan's family is mirrored by a broader tragedy at the level of the company itself, which becomes increasingly rudderless as the ‘leaders’ begin to behave more like slaves – and Logan’s authoritarian attempts to make his subordinates perform better backfire, because they actually encourage their sucking up to him. Thus, we can also read Tom’s reference to Nero as a prediction: Waystar will decline like the Roman Empire from Augustus to Nero, with ever-increasing subservience and ever-decreasing resilience, until, inevitably, it all collapses. Or, as Uncle Ewan describes his brother Logan’s career, by quoting a famous one-liner by Tacitus (loosely from his Agricola, 30): ‘Tacitus comes to mind. […] He’s made a wasteland, and calls it an empire.’ His grandson Greg (‘Sporus’) replies: ‘God, Tacitus … all killer, no filler with him.’