Succession's Arian Moayed on how to play a good bad guy
Life and Art from FT Weekend
Forhecz Topher
4.6 • 601 Ratings
🗓️ 28 April 2023
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This weekend, we meet actor Arian Moayed. You may know him as Stewy Hosseini from HBO’s Succession, a scheming private equity shark who loves money and fears no one. He's also currently in A Doll's House on Broadway opposite Jessica Chastain, playing Torvald Helmer, one of theatre history's most famous chauvinists. He talks to Lilah about the difference between a trope bad guy and a complicated person, and how to play unlikeable characters as fully formed people. Arian and his family fled from Iran in the 1980s. He says when he sees A Doll’s House, all he sees is Iran. We discuss how his culture informs his work as an actor.
--------------
Want to say hi? We love hearing from you. Email us at [email protected]. We’re on Twitter @ftweekendpod, and Lilah is on Instagram and Twitter @lilahrap.
--------------
Links:
– Succession airs on HBO in the US and SkyAtlantic in the UK. The finale is on Sunday, May 28. Here’s the FT’s review of season 4: https://on.ft.com/3LdbxZA
– A Doll’s House, adapted by Amy Herzog and directed by Jamie Lloyd, is at the Hudson Theatre on Broadway through to June 10: https://adollshousebroadway.com/
– A column by the FT’s Jo Ellison on why the Succession wardrobe is so good https://on.ft.com/3VcfulE
– A profile of director Jamie Lloyd: https://on.ft.com/3Ldbyg6
– Our conversation with Michael Patrick Thornton: https://link.chtbl.com/ftweekend-mpt
– Arian is on Twitter and Instagram @arianmoayed. His non-profit, Waterwell, is at https://www.waterwell.org/
—-------------
Our US edition of the FTWeekend Festival is back! Join Jamie Lee Curtis, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Alice Waters, your favourite FT writers, and more on May 20 in Washington, DC, and online. Register now and save $20 using the promo code weekendpodcast at ft.com/festival-us
Special offers for Weekend listeners, from 50% off a digital subscription to a $1/£1/€1 trial are here: http://ft.com/weekendpodcast.
--------------
Original music by Metaphor Music.
Mixing and sound design by Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco.
Clips in this episode courtesy of HBO.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | The TV show Succession is in the middle of its final season, and whether you watch it or not, |
| 0:06.8 | if there's one thing you know about that show, it's that it's full of outrageously unlikable characters. |
| 0:13.1 | Pretty much everyone is greedy and selfish and mean. |
| 0:18.8 | There is this one minor character that holds this line very well between deeply unlikable |
| 0:25.3 | and somehow sort of lovable. |
| 0:27.8 | His name is Stewie Hussaini. |
| 0:30.1 | Stewie is the childhood friend of one of the Roy sons, Kendall, |
| 0:33.3 | and he's a private equity bro with a stake in the company. |
| 0:36.6 | The way I would describe Stewie is probably scared of absolutely no one and just there to win. |
| 0:43.8 | Here he is talking to the big boss, Logan Roy. |
| 0:47.7 | The issue here, sir, is that everyone fucking hates you. |
| 0:53.6 | It's cloudy. It's sunny. Your C.O.O. is a fucking joke. |
| 0:58.2 | Oh. Bro. That's what people are saying. Who cares if it's true? People say that he's a |
| 1:03.3 | cooked-up dough fan that doesn't know shit from Shinola and that the two of you aren't even |
| 1:07.4 | talking to each other, which I'm getting a vibe of. Stewie is played by the actor Arian Mojed. |
| 1:13.7 | And it's no coincidence that he's a memorable character. |
| 1:16.8 | Ariane collaborated on the details of Stewie with Succession's creator Jesse Armstrong. |
| 1:22.3 | Ariane is Iranian, and he insisted that Stewie be Iranian too. |
| 1:26.7 | I was just talking to Jesse about this recently. |
| 1:29.7 | I said, do you remember I walked into your room? |
| 1:32.7 | And I was like, there are three reasons why I think this guy could be Iranian. |
| 1:35.7 | Okay. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Forhecz Topher, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Forhecz Topher and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.