The Watch - The 2019 Post-Emmys Report, a Conversation With Gerri From ‘Succession,' and Breaking Down ‘Succession’ S2E7 | The Watch

Episode Date: September 23, 2019

After the lowest number of viewers in history, the Emmys are suffering from an importance problem (1:42). J. Smith-Cameron, who plays Gerri on ‘Succession,’ joins the show to talk about her character’s unique role within the family (22:23) and and the differences between Season 1 and Season 2 (35:23). Plus, breaking down S2E7 of ‘Succession,’ “Return” (40:29). Host: Chris Ryan Guests: Andy Greenwald, J. Smith-Cameron, and Jason Concepcion Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hey, everybody. Thank you for listening to today's episode of The Watch. Great show today. Andy called in from New Mexico to talk a little bit about the Emmys, which was pretty enlightening. I thought Andy had a lot of really good points about that. So it was cool. I hope you guys are all investing your winnings properly from my Ozark tip.

I know it didn't win Best Drama, but I try to help you guys out where I can with my winners. But that's not the big news. The big news is that today on the watch, Jay Smith Cameron called him. And you know her and love her as Jerry from Succession. She is a delightful performer, one of the standouts on this amazing show. And she was nice enough to call in and chat a little bit about the making of Succession and how she watches Succession and how she processes the show with everybody else.

And then after Jay's interview, we have Jason Concepcion and me talking about last night's episode of Succession with the audio from, number one boys. So thank you so much for listening to The Watch. Let's get into the show. I need sports to have to clear the room. Stand up and walk now. Hello and welcome to The Watch. My name is Chris Ryan. I am an editor at the ringer.com and joining me on the other line, constantly rewriting himself. It's Andy Greenwald. Hey, buddy. Welcome back. What's up, man? You welcome. Welcome back to you. We haven't heard from you in a while on the Watch podcast.

Is that true? Have I been quiet? I don't think we've done anything since we ran the New Mexico pod. So I haven't talked to you, Seth. That's true. Yeah. Well, you were in Philadelphia. Mm-hmm. You've been all over the place.

I'm right here. I'm still here, baby. Oh, you're always ready to talk about the latest news in pop culture. And you're always ready to give thoughtful critiques of the most pressing television shows. Listen, I am where I have been since late May, I am in a trailer, parked, in a disused rail yard somewhere in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where I belong. That's like, I feel very comfortable. I'm surprised Pinkman's not just sitting right X to you.

Is that where El Camino ends? It's on the set of Pryor Patch? Something has ended here, and it very well may have been a life. I, um, I should say the insistencies in this crucial scene, blame the podcast. Um, but otherwise okay. Otherwise okay. If this is where Briar Patch can, you know, connects to the larger.

extended bloodlines universe? Hey, we have an actor from Bloodline on our show so we could always pretend. Speaking of actors, so last night, wait, do you want to tell me a little bit about what's been going on? I want to get the update. Oh, yeah, I mean, we should talk Emmys because Emmys happened last night.

Just that, you know, we're almost done, which is very hard to believe. We had the rap party this weekend, and we actually had two rap parties. On Saturday, we had the official rap place and it's evolved into karaoke. which was quite impressive, unsurprisingly, podcast favorite Jay Ferguson,

and the big surprise was not that Rosario is a good singer, it's that she duetted with our prop master on a meatlo song. Oh, wow. So, you know, so anything's possible. But the thing that I wanted to let people know about was that that was Saturday. And then on Sunday, we had a second event that Rosario very generously paid for

and invited everyone to a place called Main Event. Now, I think people who are younger than us, perhaps more in touch with, what's the word, fun, know about places like this. So it's a giant box off the highway. And inside of it, it's like a screen and pool tables and arcade games and an obstacle course and bowling alley, a full bar and a laser tag arena. Is it like David Busters? I guess it's like David Busters, but somehow it's open until two in the morning. It was a lot. It was a lot.

When you say younger people, do you think that's what young people like to do? You really should watch Euphoria if you think that. I was told by numerous members of the crew that this is something that they do here in Albuquerque, New Mexico. And I got to say, we may have been missing out because you know, and longtime listeners know what a big fan I am of fun. Like, I love to have fun. I love to get out there and mix it up.

And I'll say that I put my first ever game of Laser Tech. Have you done this in your life? Yeah, I have. You can imagine how seriously I take it. I'm like Benici El D'Oro raiding a cartel mansion. Your voice drops six octaves when I ask you that. I get very...

I've played laser tag in earnest twice. And one time, I basically reenacted Predator. I, like, covered myself in mud, you know? And then I threw away my laser tag gun because I got primal with it. So you were just coming up behind people and just, cutting their throats with a fake plastic knife. Like, I just think that it's interesting because...

You know you're a lot about laser knife. Nobody plays that. No. No, that is the next chapter. I think that it reveals something about people's character, though. Yeah. You know, such as we're waiting in, like, the holding area for our turn to begin, our 15-minute round or whatever.

And because our numbers were not robust enough, they'd be primarily 11-year-old. And I was immediately intimidated over. These children will run riot on me. And Jay Ferguson would not allow that to happen and started attempting to lead our group and some sort of war chance against the children. And we walk in and I completely confused. And I turned to one of our wonderful makeup artist, JQ, and I say, what team am I on? Because I guess it reveals when the game starts what team you're on.

You're on my team. And I said, thank you. Then she shot me until I was dead. I guess I regenerate. You know, like you're just on time out for a little bit. It's not real, yeah. So how would you guess? Like, you've known me for 23 years.

What would you guess my style of combat would be? Like, a lot of, like, how does this gun work while standing in the middle of the room and getting annihilated by people? All right. I was going to say that you can't hurt my feeling. You did just a little bit. No, what I did was I immediately ran up a ramp, found a very cozy corner, and then just crowd before mentioned Jay Ferguson, who was running around yelling freedom, he would just present himself as a juicy target

and then I would shoot him. But I never once left corner. It sounds like Jay and I play in a similar fashion. I also have played laser tag where you think like, okay, we're going to actually have like it's paintball without the paintballs. So we're going to take it super seriously. And then a bunch of 11-year-olds come in and you're like, watch my six! You go straight ghost protea on them. You just get all road nage. You guys are slot receivers at heart.

Like, you will sacrifice your body. Yeah. You will go over the middle. The thing is, I kept getting ambushed by 11-year-old, and because I was really, like, my head was not on a swivel. My heart was. It was tense in there. So every time a child shot me, I cursed.

Like, I yelled an epithet. Like, I feel like I was a really bad role model for these children who probably have said much worse things. Anyway, obviously Rosario won by, like, double the points of anyone else. she really? Yeah, so you think that she hosted this because she is a kind of generous person, which she is, but also because she crushes at all games. Yeah, also she's been in Tony Scott movies, so she probably knows how to like handle herself on the field of combat. In the way, laser tag turned, I was like, hey, Coney Island, you want to toss a couple ski balls? I figure that's like low intensity.

She's like, sure, checking her Instagram stories, casually throwing 40s like they're nothing. just effortless hop a shot next to her you know I was I felt like I had a respectable number of baskets made she had 55 points that's high at the end of it

to the point where she's going around telling her does Rosario want to play for the Sixers she's telling everyone a story about how a child at this amusement park place invited her to play a game with her she was like hello kind celebrity lady we play this rhythm game with her and she was like sure

and then her mom videoed it because the girl was like really into this game. And Rosario just dunked on her, defeated her handily. Was the set a titter, a flutter about the biggest night in Hollywood for the TV industry over the weekend for the Emmys? I would say no. Yeah. The Emmys have an importance problem, I think. I, you know, I love television. I don't think that the Emmys do a good job at capturing what's great about television. Or even celebrating it, which I know you've always always, sort of lightly mocked the Oscars for and just being like movies,

but I don't even think they do a particularly good job doing that about TV on the Emmys, which I, so, I don't know, I wish I could get more excited about these things, I just can't. I mean, I just, I don't, doesn't seem like Hollywood really, like, understands how to celebrate its own product anymore,

to say nothing of itself, which I think it's always going to spend a lot of money doing. I just, it seems, it's hard to get excited about this stuff. I don't think it understands its product anymore. I don't think as an industry as a whole, they know what they're selling, how it's being perceived. And I think that was just sort of shot through the entire show.

And also shot through almost everything that's being written about or talked about right now. Just as a side note, there was a piece yesterday, this very strange, like, rapturous band service interview with Bob Eiger, the chairman of Disney. For sure. And in it, there were a lot of references to how everyone in Hollywood grudgingly

adores him because he's standing up for the old storytelling houses against Netflix and Amazon, which is, you know, okay, like I guess maybe for shareholders that makes sense or nostalgic, but that's sort of a strange order to stake out in general, because it speaks to this divide between what entertainment has done for people and what it's doing now. And for me, I thought the emmings last night were a very interesting transitional moment. It's been transitioning for a few years now, but this was the first time I started to wonder, have the Emmys become the Oscars? And what I mean is, the Oscars have been just palpably fraught the last, especially the last 10 years or so, between populism and our every year there are these conversations essentially boiled down to one.

Do you even see the elites, Andy? Sure. So it's like you versus Sean Fennessee, right? Like that, that's, it's a classic binary. But, you know, it really boils down to, like, why didn't the Dark Night win Best Picture and everybody's been freaking out ever since? Last night, and it spoke to the end of a moment that you and I podcasted through and championed and for reasons that were not self-promoting, but like it certainly made our podcast easier. We were very, very quick to jump on this bandwagon, this idea that TV had the stories people wanted to tell, TV was connected to whatever was left of the quickly fracturing monoculture. and during the years when,

certainly Game of Thrones, or even before that, when something like the Sopranos or Mad Men won, now I'm not pretending that as many people watched Mad Men as watched multiple Emmy winners of practice on ABC over a decade ago, but it did still feel like it kind of had its handle around the shows that people were excited to talk about or the people who were invested in the industry were proud of.

Last night, to me, was the turn towards promoting things that are, but also inarguably not mass culture, at least not yet. I think that that's the problem. I mean, if they wanted to do mass culture, though, what would they be celebrating? Aside from Game of...

Well, that's the thing. I don't think they can anymore, but I do think it's a different vibe to be like, this is TV's biggest night, and we're going to celebrate the things that everybody's watching like Game of Thrones,

or is the mission of the Emmys becoming Fleabag is the best thing that's going to be on TV in 2019, and we're going to celebrate it and give it the nudge into the story, the larger player of the spotlight that it deserves. The Oscars is the winner's circle. The Emmys is the launch pad, right?

Well, but I'm saying that's the Oscars find itself in that position too now, right? Where Moonlight wins that picture deservedly so. But afterwards, there's all this hand-wringing about what we went to see like Avengers, and it's where it becomes more the tastemakers rather than the crowning the last part of the victory lap. Well, and you're getting to the, I think, central flaw in the Emmys. right now, which is that it's a show that's still constructed around the idea that new TV shows coming on the fall, come on in the fall and end in the spring. And that's not the case anymore. You know, I'm a little bit tired today because I'm tired of giving people winners, but I gave you

Ozark. So if you tried to go bet Ozark, I know that we didn't win drama, but Bateman and Garner won, obviously. But Ozark came on 13 months ago. You know, like, OZARC came on 13 months ago, Fleabag came on three months ago, I think, four months ago. So they're not, it's so strange to be talking about these things as if they're in the same, like, temporal space, because they're not. To say nothing of the fact that it's still such a cluster F of what's a limited series, what's a comedy, what's a drama, how are we rewarding, rewarding for what it did? And Maisel doesn't feel like a quote-unquote comedy. We have proof that a lot of these things that get nominated for limited series has just come back.

So it just seems like there's a lot of infrastructural stuff that's wrong with the Emmys. I think that if they fixed, it would be it would have a little bit more urgency like you're saying. But right now, like the idea that you know, there's this stuff that's just like oh yeah, that came out a long time ago.

Whereas the Oscars, for the most part, is the end of a cycle every year, you know? Although that is because, you know, and there's always talk about this every year as well, but like, because the Oscars and because the movie industry hasn't been, forgive me for saying this, disrupted in terms of theatrical release,

the yearly theatrical release schedule, it just conforms to the award season, right? Yeah. Like, the studios don't release their serious Oscar defenders until the fall in order to have that quick runway right up into the celebration. TV, because there's just so much of it, even if they wanted to try to pack the right part of the schedule to get the Emmy wins or nomination,

they couldn't do it because everything. would get swamped. Yeah. Well, I would argue that one of the reasons why Ozark did so well last night, I think part of it is that Jason Bateman has been around for about 30 years now in terms of working in Hollywood. And I think he has a lot of goodwill in the industry in that regard. But that show came on last August, I think.

And it has had a year to not only for people to catch up with it, but for them to talk about it in this way within the industry. And you could have seen, I mean, obviously not everybody who listens to this podcast lives in Los Angeles, but there was a palpable kind of Ozark push, billboards, events. I felt like that was something that they were really pushing. And in a way, I felt like Ozark Season 2, they rewarded that show this year for the, I know people are going to snicker when we say this, the two seasons that it's had, right? Like instead of it being, here's one at the end of your career to sort of make up for everything we've missed,

I think that that is, it essentially is playing a house of cards type role. It's a pulpy but prestigious drama. Yes, by the type, you know, I thought it was personally triggering. Wow. But otherwise it was great to meet him. You know, when I said at the beginning that this was the transitional year for the Emmys, we kind of had almost one of each type of winner in one night. Maisel is not a traditional show.

Amazon is not a traditional provider. but Tony Shaloo, just sort of checking the box and winning again, felt like a kind of traditional win. You're correctly pointing out Ozark's wins are cumulative and representing a kind of fondness for what dramas had become in the last 10 years. Ozark is in no way a traditional TV drama, but it is familiar to the people who pine for the days of basically the last decade of difficult men dramas, right? And I say that's not with any, not a prejurative plan, like that's that type of show and it fills that role really well. Leeback just feels just incredible because, you know, the first season was excellent. The second season was transcendentally better. And she is, you know, C.B. Waller Bridge is on a, is a comet, basically, of talent.

And the show was accurately rewarded in a wonderful, wonderful way. I saw someone saying that Julia Louis Dreyfus was robbed. You cannot be a six-time winner and be robbed. And as much as I enjoyed the last season of VIP, Fleabag is a transcendent television show in season two, and it deserves it in a really exciting way. I thought Veep was going to win, but I was not surprised at all about Fleabag. Everybody who I've talked to in this city in the last six months, Fleabag is so far in a way that sort of most talked about most beloved show of the year.

It is. And this is an inaccurate analogy because I'm going from something very artistic and independent to something. In the 80s, people were like, no one listens to Velvet Underground. I can't imagine Fleetbag's ratings were and knows it's the best thing. And I do think she's famous. I mean, I do think that Phoebe Waller Bridge has even just her face and her personality.

I think there are people who don't even know how to watch Fleabag who know who she is. I think that's right. And I think we also had other kinds of familiar winners like Fossie Verde in the show that I sound be kind of uneven, but she's spectacular in. So you have, but the other way that it was like the Oscars, and this happened last year as well,

it's been kind of interesting to see the writing, especially the writing in a drama series, Emmy take on some of the same role as the writing for a sitcom. You know, even going back as far as Quentin Tarantino winning for writing Pulp Fiction, but not directing it and it didn't win Best Picture. The writing Oscars are the Americans won it's overdue Emmy for writing, even that. And this year, friend of the pod, dare I say, or at least one-time guest to the pod session. Yeah. Which is a million percent deserved win the big one. I think it's, I think all that's coming next year. I think success. I think I think it might be.

Yeah, I think succession of Maisel will be sort of the big shows next timeies. I don't know about, Maisel really took a dip. Yeah, I actually like second season, but they're doing, I think that they're very specifically

grinding that show out because they know what they've got in terms of attention right now. It was interesting just in terms of the industry watching to see Amazon do so well. Netflix puts a huge, I mean, they all do,

but Netflix puts a huge premium on awards. Yeah. for Amazon, you know, which is, I think even they would admit, due to leadership changes and direction changes, had a spotty entry into the original's marketplace as a shinier award shelf at this point. Yeah, absolutely. It was interesting. I got to let you go because Jay Smith Cameron's calling in to talk a little bit about succession.

I know. Well, you know, this is the things you miss when you don't come on. I'm so jealous. I was just, she is such, she is a friend of the pot on Twitter. She really is. It's for the best. I'm not there because I would just. Please give from my very best.

We'll bring you back for false sweeps. She is a legend. Listen, this is my last week, baby. We've got four. The chance of four more sleep. And we can wrap. I can't wait. You get back to the set

and make sure they don't change too many lines. Seriously. All right. Thanks for Antskees. I'll talk to you soon. Bye, buddy. Okay, thanks to Andy. Now let's get into my interview

with Jay Smith Cameron from Succession. I'm so glad that Jay Smith Cameron has joined me. She plays one of my favorite characters on my favorite show, Jerry, on Succession. It's a thrill to have you on the watch. Thanks for joining me. Thank you, Chris.

Yeah, so last summer you gave an interview, like around the time of the first season, I think it was to town and country. And you said, when I go to work on Succession, it feels like a dark comedy, but then I'll see it, and it's very much a Greek tragedy. I was very much like a Greek tragedy. And I was curious, with the second season,

I was curious if you still view it the same way. that's a really good question and one I don't have a really definitive answer for it's obviously a drama but at least my corner of the story I think Jerry is not an immediate family member it's not a family member at all but you know kind of like family in some ways and obviously very integrated into the business but I'm able to really be out of that infrared circle of shame. So I think one reason the character is fun to play and maybe appealing for the audience is that,

I mean, she's perpetually rolling her eyes about all the bad behavior involved. I think my experience on succession has been largely different than, say, Jeremy Strong's experience. Yeah, yeah. I guess you are outside of the Kendall zone, so that would make it the less tragic, the less pathos going on there.

Yeah, I mean, I feel like there's times that are very harrowing to work there. That, you know, if you're Frank or Jerry or Carl, obviously, if you're in Hungary and you're Carl, that's not good. But, you know, it's harrowing to work there. But I always imagine it's sort of a thrill, like an adrenaline thrill for Jerry. In terms of when you're shooting, do you actually ever feel like when you're on set with, say, Jeremy? and he obviously is going through almost an entirely other show than the one that you are. Like, is it almost like worlds colliding? Sometimes like when you have a dinner table scene like at Turnhaven or you interact with him and he's kind of has the arc that he's following and you have the arc that you follow.

Do you find that you're having almost different experiences? Yes, in a way. I mean, in an example, Turnhaven, he was on the other end of the table. So you, for instance, saw more of Jeremy than I did that night. I mean, you know, except for when I watched on TV. Like, I didn't really, I wasn't privy to their conversation at all because all those conversations overlapped when we were doing them. In other words, we shot them, we covered that scene a lot,

took us a day, at least at one day, maybe a day and a half. And so, except for rare occasions, there's all those conversations are going on and with a lot of improv as connective tissue, you know, while all the other ones are going on. but they are, the cameras are floating around and covering it. So you actually have some privacy with what your storyline is. So he did and I did.

That must be pretty immersive, right? Yeah, it really is because on the one hand, it's very carefully, brilliantly written material. And then, on the other hand, they, for the most part, welcome improvisation. Or after a certain point, they'll often say like, okay, do some takes and we'll do it some, a variety of ways. And they may or may not give somebody an adjustment. And then before they move on, they'll say, and this one's a freebie. Or they'll say, just mess it up, just say whatever.

The other trick they pull is to just leave the camera rolling. So you feel, you've run out of dialogue, and in a sense you run out of the story of that little theme. and suddenly you have the ball. And so you have to kind of be ready for that to happen in a given time. And so that means it is ultra immersive in a whole different way because you're kind of handed off the... Not that they always use that. Sometimes they use it, or they use it indirectly

by it gives them ideas or something. Because I guess you would just be, you're just Jerry then, right? You're just Jerry sitting at a dinner table. You're trying, yeah, it's trying to be, yeah. And certainly that scene is a good one to pick where it was torture for the siblings. I mean, even Roman, who is having this, like, from our point of view, comedic dialogue, is also, you know, excruciatingly cringy and uncomfortable for most of the scenes. So, again, if you're a family member, and Jerry's over there rolling her eyes and sipping her wine.

So it's just a different experience. Well, if that's the experience making it, which is fascinating, I didn't know that you could have these discrete pockets of stuff happening at the same time. I was curious if you could talk a little bit about how you watch the show because you're one of the shows great ambassadors online and I think that people feel like they both know the character but also know the performer because of that. But I was curious whether or not are you sort of ahead of people in terms of watching, have you watched all the episodes or do you kind of make any, is there any weekly tradition when it comes to watching Succession and also watching the response to Succession? Yes, I guess one has sort of evolved. I'm married to a

a writer and filmmaker who totally admires the show. And even my teenage daughter is sort of interested, but has little trouble watching because of my storyline. I can imagine. This season of a little bit of a challenging where, but she's even kind of, you know, like, so we do watch. And then this season I saw a little bit advanced,

because one interesting thing is that, for instance, take the storyline between Jerry and Roman this year. when we would shoot them, we would do every little microbeat of that several different ways. Like we'd really score it. So I am kind of on the edge of my seat wondering what the final story that's being told in that scene is, if that makes sense. Yeah, for sure. Because we kind of understand what Roman is after, weird as it is. But what is Jerry's take on it is kind of elusive.

and has been sort of challenging and fascinating and fun for me to puzzle through because I think that, I mean, I would say the number one thing that Jerry makes of it is, or doesn't make, she doesn't make anything. I mean, I feel like she's, the number one thing about Jerry is that she's trying to get her head around and wondering how to handle it, which is not unlike the actress playing Jerry's problem. How do I play this scene? Because in a way, she's, you know, thinking on her feet. And so that there's these right angle turns. There's these, like, jack-knife turns in a scene where one moment I might feel, Jerry might feel bemused at another moment kind of scared and another moment really horrified and just bewildered a lot, I think.

Because, I mean, we haven't heard a lot about their backstory, but if I'm, I'm a god parent. I must have known them their whole life. So it's the oddest thing in the world to imagine. And also, Jerry, as I understand, Jerry, is she's so careful. She's so almost cunning about, you know, to the cat who always lands on her feet kind of person. And so careful that she must be so wary of stepping the wrong, you know, the wrong way and in these interactions. Yeah, and she obviously has an almost institutional knowledge of the sort of going back to adolescence, the histories of these kids. I mean, you can see that in the interactions, especially with Roman and Shiv, although obviously Roman has gotten, the relationship with Roman has gotten a lot more perverse this season. I was curious, I want to go back to, I do have a question about something you were just talking about, but I was curious, if your daughter does not care for the Roman Jerry plot line, does she have a favorite plot line on Succession?

I'll have to ask for them, so I don't have a good answer for you. I think she, you know, she's known Kieran almost her whole life. Oh, God. And so, because Kenny has worked with, my husband's worked with Karen a lot. I've worked with Kieran. We've known them for a while. So I think she just finds up until this wrinkle in it, I think she found Taryn's character to be a lot of fun.

So you ruined it. I don't know. And I think all the young people like Cut and Greg. Yes. Because he's sort of, you know. their ambassador. Sure. I wanted to ask you, though,

because one of the things that we've been discussing a lot with this second season, and especially as it's gone along, is, you know, I don't find this show all too mysterious in the way you would find, like, lost mysterious or whatever. But I do find that there's this ambiguity

about what's transpired in between episodes and possibly what's transpired off-camera between characters. Right, right. Yeah, and I think that that's, been, they've turned that knob up a little bit this season where you're like, oh, wait, so Kendall and Shiv, have they had conversations since Safe Room? Because their relationship seems to go back and forth, but how much is it's theater? Do you guys on the set speculate about that?

Is there a lot of information given to you about here's everything that's happened to Jerry since the last time you've been on camera to this time? Or is it kind of more played a little Lucy Goosey? I guess I would pick the Lucy Goosey answer. I happen to ask Jerry or the writing staff that's on set a lot of questions. But often I don't even put things together until I see it because there's so many, this show is more than the sum of its part. It's one of those, which I think is one of the secrets of the success, I think, is that

it doesn't over-explain, in fact, it sort of under-explains things in this way that makes the audience have to work at it and think about it and connect the dots. And I think people really respond to that. They don't like things dumbed down. I ask my belief. Oh, I agree with you. So I think that's really thrilling for, I mean, and I, so when I watch it, I'm sometimes like, oh, oh, oh, I see.

Because also one thing that happens on really all the TV shows I've ever worked on, but definitely, especially on this one, is that there are often rewrites that come in, sometimes in the wee hours. And it's very hard to keep any one person's script completely. Like you can't, it's hard to stay, you can kind of track your storyline as it morphs along. But even if you read, even if you read the rewrite, it's a little hard to study it and keep it all in your head because it keeps changing. Plus you add that element, the variable of the improv. So you don't really know, there's no way to know all the content that's in it until you,

you see it, really. Yeah. And then the edit, I would think it must be an interesting job for the editors because then they have to kind of tell the narrative and they all seem to adopt to this style of, you know, a slight feeling of mystery, like you mentioned, like not all the dots connected. And so how do they keep that, the thrill of that and the fun of that, but make it not impenetrable, you know?

Yeah, well, I guess that's sort of the genius of the episode structures by having them be sort centered around these unofficial reunions and these events rather than the way, you know, it's like, well, here's an A plot and a B plot and a C plot and it's taking place over the course of however much time. As long as you know everything has to happen in this party or everything has to happen in this at this ideas conference or whatever, if you have those kinds of guardrails, I guess you can do all sorts of things. Yeah, yeah, but I mean, just even like little, I don't know, little innuendo that happens or little nuanced behavioral things that might happen on set, if you're not on set that day or you're

in the makeup trailer when it's shot, you don't get all the tiny little micro implications. You can't really infer them until you see them because they're unfolding as it's shot, if that makes any sense at all. Yeah, no, that totally makes sense. I was curious whether or not you have been one of the things that happened in the first season, and especially over the first few episodes, I was a very, I was immediately

attracted to the dialogue and I just love the world and the story that the show is telling, but I know a lot of people sort of had to do, get used to the morality, let's say, of the characters. And I think that there was a likeability factor, which is an interesting thing to consider. I mean, I think we'd like to just sort of be like, no, I mean, there's plenty of amazing art about terrible people. But I was wondering for you as somebody who probably would not particularly like some of the characters on this show if you were interacting with them in real life, whether that was ever

an issue for you as an actress? That's an interesting question. I think I have always sensed there's a little bit of a cool objectivity to, I would say, Jesse and writers and producers outlook about the show. It's a little cold and objective. It's not so I've always felt that they were never endorsing their behavior or their morality ever. It always felt almost like you could almost interpret it as, you know, exposing them instead of, you know, asking for empathy about it. So it's almost like in spite of that strong undertow of like, oh, how disgusting all these people are, which is sort of gratifying the sense that the point of view of the show is that they're disgusting. It just makes sense. And then you get surprised by feeling empathy for Kendall or Roman.

Sure. And I guess I just have a taste for that kind of mean, funny, when it's done really well. Like the first table read that I did, I was trying to figure out what the tone was of it. And I came up to Jesse afterwards, and I said, this is kind of like I, Claudius. Yeah. And he was like, oh, that's good. Yeah. I guess it is kind of.

He's like, I'll take it. Yeah. You know, it's kind of fun. It's very clear all along with they're horrible. Like you, you know, but it's people you love to hate. Yeah. But you're hating them. And I think that probably, to some extent, it has, I mean, it's very British in that way, in some ways.

Because there's a lot, there's a long tradition of just that scathing satire of upper class buffoons. in British television and British fiction and everything else. The last thing I wanted to ask you about is I know you are delightfully on Twitter. Really, just like one of the few good things about Twitter is your account. You share your opinions on the president on Milky Way candy bars. I was wondering, though, that was a good thread. And you had some really good people getting involved in that discussion about candy bars. And I also dislike Milky Way.

So I was happy to see my view shared. You just like them. I don't like them. No, I think there's a lot of better options out there. But I was wondering whether or not you had started to become conversant in the way in which Jerry specifically, but just the show in general, has now become sort of part of the language of Twitter when commenting on anything, you know, from a Green Bay Packers game to something that happens on the Emmys. And people use sort of screenshots from succession to use it as just like shorthand.

I know that Jerry's line to Roman about, I have some questions but go on when he's described. I have some thoughts, but go on. It has become a real, like, has had a second life as a meme. Have you gotten to experience that at all? Yes. That's good. Yes.

It's delightful. I think that's great. I mean, I feel very lucky to play a part like this because she's, she is some sort of outside of them enough to be, I mean, I feel like even in my original audition, where I didn't really know what was going on in the sides because I didn't know the whole script. And they were referring to, I guess, looking back, the Kendall-Dewy takeover plan in season one.

But I didn't really understand. I didn't know what it was about because I hadn't read the whole script. But they were doing, but both brothers were being vulgar and disgusting. And I just was wincing at everything. But not like I was really wounded, but just like I was bored and disgusted. And I felt like that, you know, that's kind of, was my original take on the other characters, and that sort of everyone began to write Jerry that way

and direct Jerry that way, and so it sort of evolved. And I have a feeling it's because it gives, I don't know, it's maybe, I don't know, maybe the only person that's, that's one of the, you know, regular characters who is able to just step outside and shake her head. Have a drink at the end of the night. God. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah, absolutely. He has a lot of self-medicating them. I think she's had a saving day with the Roy's. I don't think she does enough. I mean, I think,

quite frankly, after one of those days, I would need some, like a hyperbaric chamber full of, you know, like deadwood opium or something. Like, I really would need to relax. Yeah, I guess you'd get in your to it a little bit, right? Yeah, right. Well, Jay, thank you so much for calling in. If you're ever in town, we'd love to have you on in the studio when Andy's back. Oh, I'd love that. It's just such a delight to talk to you because we're such huge fans of the show and the performance. Thank you, Chris. Take care.

Thank you so much. Thank you so much to Jay. And now let's get into the audio of number one boys, the Succession After Show with me and Jason Concepcion. You can watch that on Twitter and YouTube if you want to see Jason and I wearing open collared suits. Hello, and welcome to Number One Boys, the Ringer Succession, After Show. That's Jason Concepcion. I'm Chris Ryan. This is about the return, the seventh.

episode of the second season of Succession, and that was a bummer. Pomer! You can have multiple people have their figurative throat slit on a television show. You love to see it. Oh, my gosh. Kendall putting pound bills through the door slot. Yeah, this will make up for it, I guess. Victim's family that he manslaughtered.

Clearly under the influence of numerous drugs stumbling in the night. Not good. It was just a rough scene. So we're going to buy our cell on this. episode that was one of the darker, less like, kind of built and board material episodes, I think I can remember, but it's still like a lot of movement. So let's do buy or sell, Jason. What are you buying?

I'm buying betrayal. What does it even mean when you are in a world inhabiting a world in which betrayal is like with a coin of the realm? Yeah. Really, the thing to do is to betray somebody and then when they call you on it, act absolutely aggrieved that they would dare suggest that you would betray them. I think that, you know, the game that Raya and Logan ran on Shiv is unbelievable in its audacity. And also, Shiv walked into this.

It's like pre-glacier melt, Arctic Circle cold. Just used her own desire for, you know, recognition and her own ambition to, like, get a piece of something. thing and used it against her in the most devastating of ways and unbelievable. Just when you think, like, Logan, after slapping his son in the face, can't get worse. He actually gets much more depraved and worse. Let's just run through Logan Roy's fathering techniques. Blackmail's his son after his son commits murder, essentially. Yeah.

Slaps his other son in the face after exiling. him to an amusement park. Yes. Dangles, the CEO, and basically running his company to his daughter, and then essentially plays mind games with her for most of the season. And dangles in a way that felt so sincere

and heartfelt at the time. Yeah. And then what, like, so, as far as betrayal goes, with what you're talking about, I'm still kind of, like, wondering what, like, what is it, what about Marsha here? Like, is he just, like, I'm out on Marsha for some, or do you think this is all a game? Here is what, I've been thinking a lot about Logan and here is what it is.

Everyone to him is a means to an end is a piece. And what he's really great at is figuring out what that person wants and offering it up as a way to get what he wants out of them. But then never actually paying. He never pays anybody back for their emotional or professional labor. Think about the contractor. The raccoons aside, he never intended to pay that. In every deal, he doesn't want to pay. And additionally, his business is his life, right?

It's very intimate to him. It's a family business. It is like, yeah, exactly. So professional and intimate relationships, that's all the same thing. And in those relationships, he never intends to offer a fair deal. Look at the way he treated Marsha. I've treated Caroline, Lady Caroline. It's, hey, I'll go as high as 50, but offer her 10.

and it would make me really happy if you would screw her over this. He wants to screw everyone over. That's just the way he is. In every single relationship that he has, he wants to not pay the full amount. While still giving somebody just enough to keep them addicted to him. That's exactly what it is. He gave Lady Caroline 3% of the business.

He gave Marcia. Clearly Marcia thought that she was in this relationship as a co-equal partner, not the case. And now that he, Marsha has like ambitions to rise above her stations, kind of bucking the reins. Let's get Ray in there. The interesting, keep in mind that line from, I think, last week when Marsha says, and our jesties, when Marcia said to him, I know exactly who I married.

Right. She meant it as a compliment, but it will be interesting to know how well she actually knows her husband. I'm buying a sibling solidarity. Usually succession is about sibling rivalry, but in the very last shot of this episode, pretty much, we get what we've been looking for. Fascinating. What's been happening since Safe Room between Kendall and Shib? And whether or not there had been some sort of breakdown in their relationship after he

kind of came to her and he's like, it's not going to be me, but I hope if it's you, you have a place for me. We sort of saw this, like, hostility between the two of them over the last couple of episodes, even through this episode. Yeah. And then at the end of the episode, with Raya on the plane, with Raya making her move, Shiv calls Kendall from her car, he's on the plane, he knows exactly how to handle it. He's not like, hey, Shiv, are you calling me?

He's like, hey, yeah, like they have a plan. And so what is that plan? And also now, it'll be really interesting, and people with some time on their hands can do this. I look forward to doing it myself. Going back over the last three episodes, if indeed this is a partnership, and rewatching their scenes together and rewatching their scenes just in general. Like, obviously there's a little bit of Kendall that's just going off the rails right now, but you take In our Justi's in the panel talk. And Kendall almost willingly walking into machine gun fire so that Shiv can dunk on him.

Right. Someone's setting her up to be the like controversial hero figure in that panel talk. Was that something they planned in the beginning? Is that why they were so nervous about the three of them walking out there and Roman being like, I'm going to mess this up? Yeah. But I'm really curious about, Shiv knows that she screwed up with her Rea conversation. She walked into a trap to some extent,

but how much have they been planning? I've been picking over the, we have a problem line. I guess on one hand, you could look at that as saying, we, as in the siblings, have a problem,

but I... I think it's the two of them. I love that idea that they've been, you know, maybe in an unstructured way, Kendall has been working towards making Shiv the palatable choice for CEO. Yeah, and you think about even the way that Shiv's voice changes when she called Kendall. It's not like I'm calling to call you a piece of shit.

I'm going to open with some banter. It's like immediately, hey, we have a problem. Is she on the plane? I think I walk into a trap. That's like she gets right after it. So the Kendall Shiv thing is going to be huge in the last couple of episodes. What are you selling? I'm selling, I'm selling Shiv because, man, you just can't, like, don't even take that meeting.

With Raya Jarrell, why? Like, what's the up? Especially with Reyes setting it up by saying Shiv's not as smart as she thinks she is? What's she doing here? Why is she in England? Why is she in London at this particular time? Like, what's the upside to taking this meeting? There's none.

The idea that after being fired from PGN for essentially attempting to undercut the Pierce family, she would then have some influence with the Pierce family is laughable. Like, don't take this meeting. Also, just like consider the source. Yeah, consider the source. Why, if she's asking you for your blessing to have an affair with your dad, whether or not you care about it or not. Unbelievable.

This is already you're on unsteady ground. So, like, why are you walking into this? I am selling motherly love It is no surprise These people are so fucked up Lady Caroline, what the fuck When Lady Caroline is like When when Shib says who cares Roman

It's all numbers Like that's so obvious But her just being like I either get Christmas with you Or I take this mention in the Hamptons That's worth $150 million Also I mean like The devastating scene again

Is like her just being like We could talk about Oh and Kendall's like Your deep emotional pain. But maybe we should just do it over an egg. Sike, I'm breaking out the back door. Is it terrible right now? Because I'm quite tired.

And if it's, you know, something heavy, wouldn't it be great to do it over an egg? It's like, what? Are you kidding me? She's amazing. It's just these people are so damaged, but you can see why. And also, she's equally a part of this kind of,

she's only interested in doing things to drive Logan crazy. That's it. Her children, her very children, are merely a means to annoy her ex-husband. That's it. She doesn't care that they would be with her on Christmas. She just wants them to not be with Logan because that's like an expression of winning one over him.

Although she does seem to have, when she says to Shiv, like, she agrees with her and she's like, oh, finally, solidarity after 20 years or whatever. So she does seem to have some, like maybe there's an original wound there, but for the most part, she just seems interested in screwing Logan. So are you, are we, are we done with buy and sell? Yeah, let's get ready. Yeah, I'm done. Let's get the number one boy.

I'm going to go Raya. Yeah. But it's like, I'm going Raya the way you would go for like a clearly shitty NFL team that won a week one. Like, I think Raya is on a hot streak right now. She's on a hot streak. But I'm not, I'm shorting it, but I'm giving her number one boy. You know, it's kind of like, um, one of my favorite video games is Skyrim and It's kind of like when you walk into a cave where all these adventurers have gone before and all their bodies are just like littered before you.

Rea is like entering this cave of the ancients thinking, oh, I'm going to be the one that wins the CEO job from Logan Roy. And it's like that path is just littered with skeletons. She definitely won though and has acquired some part of Logan's power, but it's like this is not going to end the way she thinks. Although two vipers like Logan and Rea, like each... Clearly she is also like not going into this eyes closed and is... Must be thinking of ways that she can also stab Logan in the back. She's definitely also learning to speak Roy.

Oh, yeah. Like that whole scene where they're sitting there with Shiv's memo and just eviscerating it, which is like, honestly, like... That's like anxiety dreams for me. I love the font. It's quite extravagant. It's like a bunch of my friends and family sitting around looking at my writing. Like, when she is analyzing each of the children in turn with Logan in terms of their fitness for the CEO job, and then she's like, well, Shiv, not as smart as she thinks she is, as you said. Roman, he could actually be good. My jaw dropped.

And I'm trying to figure out, like, does she really think that? Is that the show trying to tell us, look how crazy these people actually are? Like, their ways of analyzing it. Or is she trying to, like, up Roman stock? because Roman inevitably can't live up to it. It's like, what is the games within games? I have no idea. Let's go to Biggest Burn of the Week. Oh, my God. Roman, bring him back an oldie but a greedy. Roy Boy's on tour, and we got him in all sizes, Alpha, Beta, and Cuck.

And looks right at Kendall. And, you know, Cuck, what a run for that word. I got to tell you, like, I'm happy for, you know, life takes and it gives. I'm happy that this dallions with Naomi Pierce, which can only end badly, two addicts, jet setting across the globe. Did he even like ever, like, is she just still waiting for him at the zoo? I know. That was so sick, too, when he's just like, oh, I'm going to take Naomi to the zoo. He's just like, no, you're going to come eat shit with the people, like the family of the guy you killed.

Yeah, come hang out and look at the childhood pictures on the fridge of the man that you murdered. Come do that with me. Isn't it weird if I bring you out here and you just sit in the car like a Labrador? No, you should come in, in fact. What a psycho? And look at the ruination which you have wrought upon this family. Oh, man, what's your biggest bird of the week? It's Raya in that talk with Logan on the jet where she's analyzing the kids and she says about Kendall.

Kendall, I don't know. It's like you put him in a big diaper and now he can shit himself whenever he likes. That's actually quite appropriate. Also, biggest burn of the week is the show. succession on English cuisine, an absolutely brutal series of owns, starting with Romans saying, telling Logan and what he had for dinner the last time they went over there, which was three dusty trout for six people and some mustard. And then they go over and it's like, Pigeon. Pige.

careful, there's still some shot in the pigeon, and the shot might have pushed some feathers into the wounds. Shot and feather. It's like, great. Yeah. The fact that they have to go to the convenience store and, like, load up on, like, pringles and bananas before they go to dinner is pretty amazing. And then he picks, like, some jar of, like, who even knows what? He's like, is this actually for, is this actually edible? It's actually for consumption?

You put this out here so people can eat it? This is for show. Yeah. What's your line of the week? Oh, man. I'm going to go with Roman talking to Shiv saying, do you know nothing of the company you're supposed to be taking over? Waste our Royco.

We do hate speech and roller coasters. I'm also doing Roman when he says, when Logan says anything you save under the 50, we can split. And Roman says, well, that ought to cover the subsequent therapy. Who's kidding? Roman is not going to therapy. That's actually exactly right.

Let's get into Finance 101. Finance 101, you come for it, you need it, you want it. It's the advice on money from the guys who know money. That's right. Jason, this week we're talking about shareholders. Right. Let's talk about shareholders and specifically voting stock shareholders. The other shareholders, those people that own stock in which you can't vote,

fuck them. They don't matter. They don't matter. They actually think that they own stock. It's great. It's actually just like a piece of fountain. paper towel. It's right. Like what I do, what I like to, when I describe that kind of stock, what I like to do is go like this and go here. Do you want, how much of it do you want?

Well, it's like I've started a lot of companies. Right. And I've given out a lot of stock. Like everybody on camera here right now owns a piece of my ESIG company, but they actually don't have a say in how I'm using their identities to fake medical research. Everybody in the company, which we founded in Mongolia, that makes, you know, quasi-legal vape fluid. Yeah. Which is in the news right now. It's technically not fluid, but that's okay.

Right. It's something that comes out of a rock over there. I don't know, like, where it comes from, but it tastes. It's copper mixed with microplastics mixed with pigeon feathers. Right. Anyway, they are mostly paid in non-voting stock. Yeah. Congratulations.

That's finance 101. Let's get in and let them eat cake, the crazy rich moment of the week. What do you got? Mine is just like the transatlantic largesse of the Roy family. It's unbelievable. So like I have family in England and like when I go to England, it's, it's, it's, there's a lot of coordination. You're not going a private jet and you're not, you're not like, you don't have opinions on the various pilots that fly your planes. No, I don't have opinions on my pilots.

I'm not immediately going to my Knightsbridge apartment that probably costs 600 million pounds now. And then I don't also have a mansion. in the country to retreat to, nor am I going to Cheltenham races with a guy named the Ulsterman. The Ulsterman. Can't wait for that guy to show up. So, yeah, just like the largest. And then on the flip side is Naomi Pierce, who is a barely functioning recovering addict. I don't even know if recovering is doing a lot of work.

Working out in Northern California just happened to be at the biennial. And it's just going to hop over to go to the zoo with Kendall. Has that consistently glassy, bemused look that she likes to take. with her, like, luggage? There's two things, can I ask you actually really quick? Sure. Are you worried more about Kendall's dick pick? Or Kendall dropping a couple hundred pound notes through the mail slot of that family?

I mean, like, it's pick your poison at this point. I think it would be the pound notes since those speak directly to his guilt in a crime, which is murder. Yeah, it's a little weird dude. If you show up at their house the day that your dad does, apologize to them. And then the next day they wake up and there's like a couple hundred pounds through their mail slot. Like it doesn't take like that you got Ellen Meeren and prime suspect to figure out where that came from. I also just love the idea of, of Kendall, you know, just

absolutely smashed on cocaine and alcohol going to like five different ATMs because the, the max you can take out is like 300 pounds or whatever. Do you have a crazy rich moment of the week? I do, and it's the general ability that Logan has to be like, here's a figure with three commas and seven zeros in it, and I'm talking about it like I'm going to the corner store to buy like a newspaper. It could be 50, it doesn't. Yeah, like 10, like us offer 10 million. But that goes back to what you were saying before. It's like at the end of the day, does he even plan on actually paying that? No.

Does he just plan on tying people up in litigation? Absolutely not. He does not want to pay. Ever. He's not paying. Logan will not pay you. Let's get into predictions for next week. We didn't really talk about Tom and Greg's adventure this week, but there was a very small moment.

This is wind. This is wind. That was a very big moment. There was a very small moment when Tom goes to Greg's apartment. And Greg is having a daytime meeting with a group of very well-dressed. Thank you. Very good-looking people. Next wave.

What do you think was happening with the next wave meeting? Next wave. I want to just say this. The B-plot, the kind of like, Unseen Greg B plot in which he, one, demands to now be called Gregory, two, is doing cocaine, and three is talking to Next Wave, is incredible and needs to be its own spin-off. I am going to predict that Next Wave is a nexium-like cult. So, I love this. I love it.

I did not pick up on this. I thought it was more like a resistance movement thing, where it was like, Greg, you. you work at ATN, you could be our like our mole, our guy on the inside, let's bring down the evil. Because he's expressed before that he's like, very softly expressed. His principles. His principles are against what ATN stands for, but you think it's something like... I think it's a nexium-like sex cult. Of young, comprised of attractive young professionals who are in over their head in various ways. And I think Greg is just like a lamb with...

a shaved neck to people like this. Like, get him up there and let's cut his throat. Greg is the number one boy. If that's the case, that is amazing shit. This has been number one boys for Jason. I am Chris. We will be back here after the East Coast airing of next week's succession. Catch us in the usual places. Thanks for watching.