Before Succession premiered, Jesse Armstrong, the creator, executive producer, and showrunner of the HBO hit, said that the characters are a fictional family. "There's loads of succession stories to draw on," he told Variety in 2018. "We wanted to draw on all the good, rich stories there are about succession and about media and high politics." A few years ago, however, Armstrong wrote a screenplay about the inner workings of the Murdoch family that was never produced, so that comparison is inevitable. Still, there are definitely a few other prominent families who could have inspired the series.
Over the years, even more names have been added to the list of possible inspirations for the Roys: the Trumps, the Carnegies, the Redstones. In his dismissed all the implications with regards to his character, patriarch Logan Roy. "He’s not Rupert Murdoch. He’s certainly not Donald Trump, and he’s not Conrad Black." He added, "He is a self-made man, but there was something in his childhood that made him decide, 'f*ck it. It doesn’t work. None of it works.'"
Nonetheless, it's hard to ignore the parallels between some of the world most famous (and occasionally infamous) business families—whether it's intentional homage or simply the nature of the zeitgeist. Here, a breakdown of potential real-life Roys.
The Murdochs
Similarities: Both families have an aging patriarch who has stayed at his company well past standard retirement age (Murdoch, 92, stepped back into the role of chairman of Fox News after the late Roger Ailes's ouster and now serves as chairman of Fox Corporation). James Murdoch, 50, was the CEO of 21st Century Fox from 2015 to 2019, and his 51-year-0ld brother, Lachlan (all three are pictured here together in 2016), is the executive chairman of Nova Entertainment, co-chairman of News Corp, and executive chairman and CEO of Fox Corporation. Their older sisters, Elisabeth and Prudence, are also media executives in the United Kingdom and Australia, respectively.
The clearest visual parallel between Rupert Murdoch and Logan Roy occurred in the final season, when Logan's speech on paper boxes directly referenced a similar moment when Rupert gave a speech to the WSJ newsroom on boxes in 2007.
Differences: While the first episode of Succession showed the Roy family traveling in a fleet of helicopters, it's not clear that they are quite as well off as the Murdochs, whose fortune estimates to be worth $18.1 billion.
Pictured: Rupert Murdoch and his wife Anna with their children Lachlan, James, and Elisabeth in 1989.
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The Sulzbergers
Similarities: Arthur “A.G.” Sulzberger (left), 42, is the fourth Arthur Sulzberger to hold the position of publisher of the New York Times—a clear indication that this family has dealt with succession planning over the years. Season two of Succession included a plotline in which Logan Roy planned to acquire a media company controlled by the Pierce family, which reemerged in the final season. The Pierces share a number of characteristics with the brood that has owned the Times since 1896.
Differences: A.G.'s father, Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, Jr., stepped down from his post as publisher in 2018, when he was only 66 years old—more than a decade younger than Logan Roy.
The Redstones
Similarities: Like the Roys, the Redstones control a media conglomerate. Through their National Amusem*nts holding company, the family has reportedly controlled Viacom and CBS for years. Family members have also been involved in some real-life succession drama: Shari Redstone, the 68-year-old daughter of the late patriarch, Sumner, filed a lawsuit in 2018 that alleged CBS had inappropriately attempted to strip her of control of that company. Shari now serves as president of National Amusem*nts and chairman of ViacomCBS.
Sumner Redstone, his daughter Shari, and his grandaughter Kim in 2003.
Differences: Sumner Redstone died in 2020, but four years earlier he relinquished his chairmanships of CBS and Viacom after a court-ordered examination by a geriatric psychiatrist. Logan Roy isn't there yet with Waystar-Royco.
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The Hearsts
Similarities: All of William Randolph Hearst's five sons followed the newspaper mogul into the family business. (He's pictured left with his infant son William Jr. in 1908.)
Differences: The family-owned Hearst corporation, which owns more than 360 businesses (including Town & Country), was established on March 4, 1887, when William Randolph Hearst put his name on the masthead of the San Francisco Examiner. The company has been passed down through three generations, and his grandson William Randolph Hearst III is now its chairman.
The Maxwells
Similarities: British publishing magnate Robert Maxwell (pictured here with a young Prince William and Prince Charles in 1985) built a newspaper empire that included the New York Daily News, and like the Roys, the patriarch's sons (Ian and Kevin Maxwell in this case) worked for the family company. Robert's daughter, Ghislaine, also worked for the family publications before she met the late disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein. In 2022, Ghislaine Maxwell was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison for charges including the sex trafficking of a minor.
Differences: Maxwell's suspicious death on a yacht in the Canary Islands in 1991 triggered a meltdown at the family company, which filed for bankruptcy protection the following year.
The Carnegies
Similarities: Brian Cox, who plays Logan Roy, once said that industrialist Andrew Carnegie (left) was an inspiration for the character. "This kid who had nothing, transported to Pittsburgh from Dunfermline at the age of 12. He became the richest man in the world. But at the same time he also became this demonic creature," Cox told the Financial Times in 2019. "He was a philanthropist; he built these libraries in Scotland, but he squeezed his workers in order to feed the libraries. He wanted to give his wealth away, but he couldn't escape who he was." Cox says that Roy is similarly uneasy as "a misanthrope," "a nihilist," and someone who "is disappointed with the human experiment."
Differences: Unlike Roy, Andrew Carnegie did not have a number of children waiting in the wings to succeed him. Carnegie's only child was Margaret Carnegie Miller, who served as a trustee of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, the grant-making foundation her father established in 1911. She died in 1990 at age 93.
Sam Dangremond
Contributing Digital Editor
Sam Dangremond is a Contributing Digital Editor at Town & Country, where he covers men's style, co*cktails, travel, and the social scene.
