Succession Was Rava Roy’s Personal Horror Movie (& Natalie Gold Agrees)

Rava Roy (Natalie Gold) has a terrible time in Succession and, while everyone else is angling for attention, power, and wealth, Rava’s living out her own personal horror movie. The Succession family tree is an extensive one with branches going all over the place thanks to marriages, divorces, remarriages, and cousins who decide to make unannounced appearances. For the most part, everyone in the tree wants as much Roy time as possible. How else are you going to climb the branches to the top if you don’t know who will make your climb worthwhile?

One of these branches goes from Kendall (Jeremy Strong) to Rava, his ex-wife whom Kendall has two kids with. Rava and Kendall separated sometime before the series starts, but season 1 still sees them as cordial. Rava left Kendall due to drug addiction issues, the same ones that many people in his life mock and disregard him for. You can trace just how quickly Rava and Kendall’s relationship deteriorates over the course of Succession and if you look at the show through her eyes, you’re basically experiencing a hostage story.

Rava Roy Was Not Treated As A Real Person In Succession

Rava’s Feelings And Thoughts Are Never Considered By Anyone

From the first moment we see Rava on screen, it’s apparent that no one respects her as an individual. She’s an extension of Kendall, who is not exactly the crown prince himself. Rava and her kids, Sophie (Swayam Bhatia) and Iverson (Quentin Morales) arrive at Logan’s (Brian Cox) home for his birthday party and she begins sparring with Roman (Kieran Culkin) and the other family members, as they all do when they see each other. She may be an outsider, but clearly, Rava’s played this game before, easily jousting with everyone there.

Despite her veteran status in the family, she still seems like something of an outsider, and she also seems to be happy for that to be her designation. When she first arrives at Logan’s, actually anytime she goes to a Roy-sanctioned event, Kendall thanks her profusely for coming. Sounds to me like she would have rather been anywhere else had it not been for him begging. Remember the term NRPI, “no real person involved“? It’s specifically used to refer to the people abused during the cruise ship saga, but it’s a useful shorthand for how the Roys think about others.

Rava is not a real person to them. She’s some lady Kendall was married to. Roman (and possibly Logan) aren’t even sure if Kendall and Rava have any biological kids together, a fact Roman finds hilarious rather than something to shut up about. In season 1, episode 5, “I Went to Market”, Logan accidentally (as he would claim) hits Iverson in the face with a can of cranberry sauce. Rava is furious, and so is Kendall, for a moment. Then guess what happens? Nothing. It’s just swept under the rug. Rava’s anger is ignored. No real person involved after all.

Kendall Roy Does Not Let Rava Escape His Family

As Much As She Tries To Stay Away From Kendall, He Imposes On Her Life At Every Turn

So what does Rava do? The one thing no one else in the Roy clan seems to be willing to do. Leave. She separates herself from the Roys. Not with lawyers or angrily, she just stops showing up in Kendall and the Roys’ lives whenever she is not obligated to. Kendall can date, do drugs, ruin his life, whatever he wants, but Rava is no longer going to be a part of it. Too bad for Rava though, because she’s dealing with the Roys, and they’re not in the business of giving up their toys.

She gets season 2 off at least, maybe because of Kendall’s state of mind after the Succession season 1 finale, or maybe because he’s become infatuated with another woman, Naomi Pierce (Annabelle Dexter-Jones). That’s all good with Rava. As long as it keeps Kendall and the Roys from bothering her and her children, she’s golden. All good things must come to an end though, and in season 3, Kendall’s right back up in her business. Literally. He moves his base of operations to her apartment.

Oh, and he brings Naomi and Cousin Greg (Nicholas Braun) for good measure. If the frustration of their presence isn’t obvious, they open up an heirloom wine bottle for what looks like a Chinese food dinner. Rava is trapped in her house with the Roys, and they’re multiplying. Then comes season 4, and Rava’s husband, who claims to love and want the best for her children, essentially gets a fascist racist elected president; and her kids are now being harassed from both sides of the political spectrum.

She is being suffocated, and even her safety is beginning to look like a trap. Actress Natalie Gold said about the secret security Kendall orders to track Rava (via ETOnline),

“It’s Kendall’s version of trying to solve a problem without any emotional warmth and interaction. You know, Kendall, I think, has always said — and Rava has always given a kind of ‘Yeah, OK’ to — ‘Everything I do, I do for my kids.’ So, he’s trying to fix this problem by just putting security on them and doesn’t tell her, doesn’t confer with her and they end up being terrified in a car thinking that they’re being followed when they’re already paranoid and freaked out about what’s happened in the state of the world. So, I don’t think Rava thinks that’s a great solution to the problem.”

That’s a nightmare scenario when even the things that are supposed to keep you safe end up terrifying you. It’s a look into the paranoia and fear Rava has had to deal with thanks to her previous relationship with Kendall. There’s no escaping him or the Roys’ reach.

Rava Was Right To Keep Her Children Away From Logan’s Funeral

Kendall Had No Right To Demand Rava Put Her Family In Danger

Rava does have one win, however, and that comes in Succession season 4, episode 9, “Church and State”, better known as “The One With Logan’s Funeral” in Friends parlance. At the last minute, just as Kendall is preparing to meet his family to go with them to the funeral, Rava drops a bomb on him. She’s not going to the funeral and neither is Iverson nor Sophie. They’re going upstate, to run from the riots happening on the streets, riots occurring because of the election Kendall essentially gamed.

It’s one of the angriest Kendall moments in Succession, and he threatens Rava, even standing in front of her car in a futile attempt to stop her from leaving. It might be seen by some as a cruel move to not let her children attend their grandfather’s funeral, but Gold has thoughts about that decision as well. In response to a question, if the real reason for Rava going upstate was because she was worried about her children, Gold said,

“Yes, I do think that’s one of the reasons. I think she is genuinely afraid. Absolutely. But I also think it’s part of the subtle and beautiful progression that the writers have given this character of Rava, who’s somebody who always shows up for Kendall. You know, she showed up for him in season 1 when Logan was in the hospital. She came and hugged him at four in the morning. And now the big thing has happened, his dad has died and she doesn’t go to the funeral, which is bold. I read it and I was surprised. I just thought it was an incredible decision because she has kind of made the decision in that moment to stop protecting Kendall and his feelings and to look out for herself and her kids.”

Rava has been trapped, her children abused, and her agency taken away in Succession and all she wants to do is get away. When I first watched Succession, I kept asking myself, “Why don’t these people just leave?” They have every opportunity to extricate themselves from the situation and live life on their own terms. And they can stay filthy rich doing it. Well, take one look at Rava Roy. It may be that leaving the Roy family on Succession is so difficult, even a weekend away in upstate New York is a tremendous undertaking.

Succession is a Black Comedy and Satire television show created by Jesse Armstrong. It stars Hiam Abbass, Nicholas Braun, Brian Cox, and Kieran Culkin and follows the story of an aging conglomerate owner as he deals with his declining health and the sudden realization that one of his children will soon inherit his position and run his company.

Cast

Hiam Abbass , Alan Ruck , Sarah Snook , Kieran Culkin , Natalie Gold , Nicholas Braun , J. Smith-Cameron , Matthew Macfadyen , Peter Friedman , Brian Cox , Arian Moayed , Jeremy Strong , Rob Yang , Dagmara Dominczyk

Release Date

June 3, 2018

Seasons

4

Creator(s)

Jesse Armstrong

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