‘Succession’ star Kieran Culkin reveals alternate version of Matsson confrontation: ‘I couldn’t pee’

Christopher Rosen
·3 min read
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“Succession” is famous for allowing its incredibly talented cast the opportunity to improvise scenes and movements that feel true to their characters. So it should come as little surprise that Roman Roy’s emotional outburst during Sunday’s episode, “Kill List,” could have looked entirely different from what ended up on the screen.

Speaking to Variety, Roman actor Kieran Culkin revealed he and director Andrij Parekh did numerous takes of the Roy family’s youngest member laying into billionaire tech boss Lukas Matsson (Alexander Skarsgard).

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“It wasn’t about threatening him, or trying to make him feel threatened. It was more that he was unhinged. And I didn’t know what I was going to do. Getting him to listen to me was harder, until I could actually get in his face — he’s gargantuan,” Culkin said.

Throughout the episode, Matsson poked and prodded Roman and Roman’s brother Kendall (Jeremy Strong) about the recent death of their father, Logan (Brian Cox), all while trying to negotiate a deal to buy the Roy family company. But in the closing moments, after calling Logan a “prick,” Roman was pushed to his limit. He blasted Matsson (“I fucking hate you”) and said he and Kendall would never sell him the company. But while cathartic, the outburst backfired: Matsson ended up increasing his offer to buy Waystar to such an extent that Roman and Kendall were forced to accept.

“One take they didn’t use is there was one where Lukas goes and pees on the rock. He has this little pouch for fake pee, and on one of the last takes, I went up and just unzipped and tried to pee next to him, which wasn’t in the script,” Culkin said of the scene and its other permutations. “I couldn’t pee, and then I remembered that it had been established that Roman couldn’t pee in front of other men. So then I just started peeing next to him, and as I was peeing, I started going into the scene, and he had this little smirk, the full Matsson smirk.”

Culkin was hailed after Sunday’s episode for his performance and on Monday it was revealed he’ll compete for Best Drama Actor at this year’s Emmy Awards rather than Best Drama Supporting Actor, where he was nominated for Season 2 and Season 3 of the hit HBO show.

“It’s just that’s what the show is. If I’m supporting, that would mean Kendall and Shiv [Sarah Snook] are also. And to me, that doesn’t feel like that’s the show,” Culkin said to Variety. “The show has always felt like an ensemble, but the center of gravity is this man, Logan. So it’s always sort of silly to think of these things — who’s lead, who’s supporting, but it always felt like he’s lead, and we’re all dancing around him.”

Last year, “Succession” received a record 14 acting nominations from the Emmy Awards, including nominations for Culkin, Strong, Snook, Cox, and Skarsgard as Best Drama Guest Actor.

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