The jury still seems to be out on Succession's Kendall Roy. Is he better than the rest of his family as he flat-out stated in Season Three's penultimate episode, "Chiantishire", or is he just as bad as the rest of them? Regardless of whether or not what fans expected from Kendall in season 3 came true or not, there's no doubt he still lives in a realm dominated by quite a few shades of grey. But what about the man who plays him? Does Jeremy Strong also live in this somewhat dubious realm? Well, no but due to a recent interview with The New Yorker, a lot of attention has been placed on how Jeremy does his job.
Jeremy's famous friend Jessica Chastain called a "one-sided" and "snarky" article, but fans on the internet are making fun of Jeremy's approach to acting. While Jeremy has added a lot of money to his net worth thanks to Succession, it appears as though he doesn't enjoy the process of making the show. Not in the way his co-stars clearly do. So, do they think he's "difficult"? Do they actually like him? Here's everything we know...
Jeremy Strong's Method Acting And Not Seeing Succession As A Comedy Has Caused Backlash
Make no mistake, Jeremy Strong is exceedingly grateful for his massive role on Succession. There is rarely a time when he doesn't praise the show as well as the people who work on it. But he's also stated that he find the process really hard to make. During his December 2021 New Yorker interview, Jeremy said, "I take [Kendall] as seriously as I take my own life." He also stated that he does not find the character funny... but perhaps this is why the character (as well as his Emmy-winning performance) works so well?
In the New Yorker profile, journalist Michael Schulman stated that Jeremy's colleague, the extremely rich Kieran Culkin, believes Succession is a comedy. But Jeremy doesn't. He treats it as a life and death drama. To his credit, creator Jesse Armstrong said that this is precisely why he hired Jeremy in the first place.
But it wasn't just Jeremy's different perspective on Succession's genre that caused controversy, it's the fact that he admitted to being a method actor along the lines of Daniel Day-Lewis.
"I think you have to go through whatever the ordeal is that the character has to go through," Jeremy said in the interview. "If I have any method at all, it is simply this: to clear away anything—anything—that is not the character and the circumstances of the scene. And usually, that means clearing away almost everything around and inside you, so that you can be a more complete vessel for the work at hand."
In Michael Schulman's piece, Jeremy is painted as an over-the-top actor who simply cannot have any fun at work. Play this against how his castmates see their jobs and one could draw conclusions that Jeremy is challenging to work with. At least, this is what some fans on Reddit are claiming. In fact, one thread from two years ago states that Jeremy reportedly makes everyone call him "Kendall" on set.
Jessica Chastain publicly came to Jeremy's defense by saying, "I've known Jeremy Strong for 20yrs & worked with him on 2 films. He's a lovely person. Very inspiring & passionate about his work. The profile that came out on him was incredibly one-sided. Don't believe everything you read folks."
So, we know what she thinks... but what do his Succession co-stars have to say?
Jeremy Strong Has A Complicated Relationship With Some Of His Castmates
Among the cast of Succession, there's clearly a lot of respect for Jeremy's dedication to the character as well as the result he gets from his method approach. But that's not to say that they don't worry about him or that his process doesn't cause tensions on the set.
"The result that Jeremy gets is always pretty tremendous," Brian Cox (Logan Roy) said, according to E! Online. "I just worry about what he does to himself. I worry about the crises he puts himself through in order to prepare."
Brian went on to say that Jeremy "genuinely suffers" while making Succession and this can make things a tad challenging. "You've got to let it go and say 'This is fine,' as long as what's coming out at the end is justifiable," Brian continued. "That's tough, because sometimes you say [laughs]: 'Jeremy, for f*** sake. Stop it now.'"
Brian expanded further on his relationship with the man who plays his on-screen son in an interview with GQ from October 2021. He stated, "He’s very sweet, Jeremy, but he’s complicated, you know? And he does think there’s an element of religious experience about doing our work. I don’t agree: I feel that what you have to do is you have to be free of all that, you have to be able to sort of keep yourself in a channel, where you act like a receiver and a monitor, so that things are passing through you. And he lets it affect him, to such an extent that I sometimes worry about him, because it’s intense to live at that level. But it’s also part of the learning curve."
The fact that Jeremy's approach to the craft so differently also has caused issues with his on-screen brother played by Kieran Culkin.
"The thing is, [Jeremy] doesn’t want to know if the actor [opposite him] is going to do [blank], because that would mess him up," Kieran Culkin said on Marc Maron's podcast. “Sometimes, he doesn’t want you to say certain words. Like, don’t call it a 'scene' or things like that. It can be pretty particular sometimes."
Jeremy's mood on set also is a source of controversy, according to Kieran. "If Kendall is in a really good place, then Jeremy is in a much better mood. If Kendall is in a dark place, then it’s very much don’t talk to him. So, that has its own challenges, too."
