Matthew Macfadyen Says a ‘Succession’ Spinoff Would Be ‘Strange’: It’s ‘Highly Unlikely’
“Succession” star Matthew Macfadyen is just fine with his character Tom Wambsgans going out on top.
The newly minted 75th annual Emmy winner said backstage in the press room that a “Succession” spinoff is “highly unlikely” after showrunner Jesse Armstrong concluded the series in 2023.
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“I would say, ‘Never say never,’ but it’s highly unlikely,” Macfadyen said of a follow-up show. “But it will depend on what [creator] Jesse Armstrong wants to do, but I think Jesse’s instinct, and all our instincts, is that it ended in just the right place.”
Macfadyen continued of the final season, “And we sort of didn’t tie it up, we just left [them]… to carry on in their strange and crappy world. So as nice as it would be to work with everybody again, I do think it would be strange to do a spinoff.”
Macfadyen’s character Tom takes over conglomerate Waystar Royco following the unexpected death of patriarch and CEO Logan Roy (Brian Cox). Macfadyen’s co-stars Kieran Culkin won Best Actor in a Drama Series and Sarah Snook won Best Actress in a Drama Series. “Succession” actors Jeremy Strong, Alan Ruck, J. Smith-Cameron, and Brian Cox were all additionally nominated at the Emmys among the series’ many acting nominees.
Macfadyen was nominated for an Emmy three times for his supporting turn as Tom across the HBO series; he first won in 2022 for the role. This year, Macfadyen has earned a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination and took home the Golden Globe for Best Supporting Actor.
While the “Succession” series finale proved to be a shocker to fans, series creator Armstrong admitted that he was at first “wary of saying goodbye too fast” to the show.
“My sense was that we should do one last full-fat season rather than stretch it out,” Armstrong said in the book “‘Succession’: Season Four: The Complete Scripts,” adding, “But I was wary of saying goodbye too fast to all the relationships and opportunities, of leaving creative money on the table, regretting all the subplots that would go unwritten, the jokes left untold.”
Armstrong said during NPR’s “Fresh Air” about the last episode, which set a viewership record at HBO, and especially Macfadyen’s character Tom: “For me it was a moment of equality, which has never been the case in that relationship before. Tom has always been subservient. Now he has this status, but his status is contingent. That’s kind of what the whole episode has been about. Shiv’s status is as all the kids are — secure. It’s secure in a financial sense. She has billions of dollars. She has wealth that could never diminish, whatever happened to the world. And she also has a name, which will sort of haunt her and make it interesting, to a certain degree, for the rest of her life, and that can’t be taken away from her. Whereas Tom’s position could be taken away in the click of fingers.”
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