Sarah Snook dishes about her Succession character’s surprise pregnancy

The news came early on in Sunday night’s fourth episode of Succession – Honeymoon States – where Shiv gets a call from Dr. Sharon Hasford (Dee Pelletier), who confirms Shiv is expecting.

Snook, 35, opened up about the surprise pregnancy on the official Succession podcast, revealing Shiv getting pregnant was, ‘always something (creator) Jesse (Armstrong) had discussed in the writers room.’

‘Shiv has some pretty complicated feelings about becoming a mother,’ Snook said, referring to her response to the doctor calling with amniocentesis results.

‘She’s in some ways feigning indifference, because it’s one of those things that’s almost too hard to face, and she doesn’t like dealing with emotions,’ Snook added. 

Confirms: The news came early on in Sunday night’s fourth episode of Succession – Honeymoon States – where Shiv gets a call from Dr. Sharon Hasford (Dee Pelletier), who confirms Shiv is expecting

‘It’s easier to repress things. There’s a competitiveness against her feelings with her own mother and her desire to better her own mother’s maternal qualities, but a fear that she probably won’t be able to do that,’ Snook added. 

‘A fear and a frustration that all the things she’s working toward and aiming toward, she may not now be able to achieve because she will be a mother as well as a businesswoman and, how do these two things coalesce in her life? She hasn’t really considered that as a path for her life and so it’s quite a shock,’ Snook admits.

The amniocentesis test is one given to expecting mothers who believe their child may have, ‘genetic or chromosomal condition, such as Down’s syndrome, Edwards’ syndrome or Patau’s syndrome,’ according to NHS, though Shiv was told there was no cause for concern and the baby is healthy, telling Shiv to schedule a 20-week follow-up.

Snook added, ‘In a way, it would have been easier if there was something wrong so that she could have a reason to terminate and not feel guilt. But with nothing wrong, there’s no reason to not continue.’

Shiv never tells anyone that she’s expecting – not even her estranged husband Tom Wambsgans (Matthew McFadyen), who she’s in the process of divorcing. 

‘She doesn’t have many places to turn. It’s too complicated [to tell Tom about the pregnancy], I think. It changes too much. There’s too much going on,’ Snook said. 

‘Her father just died. There’s so many business machinations happening, to then bring Tom into it in a familial sense would confuse it again. She doesn’t know how she feels about it herself. In a way, I think she would prefer to decide what her own feelings are about this before she has Tom’s feelings muddy the waters,’ she added.

Snook added that Shiv is contemplating, ‘In what way is this going to hold me back, not propel me forward? … Women are extraordinary, and yet those are the very things we use to yeah, hold them back. It’s wild.’ 

Test: The amniocentesis test is one given to expecting mothers who believe their child may have, ‘genetic or chromosomal condition, such as Down’s syndrome, Edwards’ syndrome or Patau’s syndrome,’ according to NHS , though Shiv was told there was no cause for concern and the baby is healthy, telling Shiv to schedule a 20-week follow-up

Easier: ‘It’s easier to repress things. There’s a competitiveness against her feelings with her own mother and her desire to better her own mother’s maternal qualities, but a fear that she probably won’t be able to do that,’ Snook added

When asked about the death of Shiv’s father Logan Roy, Snook revealed the cast had been, ‘given a heads up’ that the death was happening.

‘But reading the episode was really affecting, was very emotional. I think we didn’t know how it was going to happen,’ Snook said.

She adds that the siblings, ‘never get to see it happen,’ with the actress admitting that since they weren’t there when it happened, ‘by the end of the episode, there was an aspect to Sarah reading it to… is he really gone?’ 

Shiv and her siblings learned about Logan’s complications on a flight from Tom, who allowed them each to have one final conversation with their father… which Logan may or may not have heard or comprehended.

‘She’s someone who was afraid of vulnerability and taught to be afraid of vulnerability, so coming into this scene, this is going to be the most exposing time for her,’ Snook said.

‘The stakes are so high with the prospect of her father dying, not being able to be there, having to communicate that she does love him,’ she said. 

‘But also, what is the honest truth in this moment is that her love is very complex and fraught with a kind of loathing and a self-loathing as well for feeling those feelings, and a frustration. All of that is there in the writing,’ she continued.

‘Saying “I love you, Dad” at any other point in life, even at the time of his death, you would get a silence perhaps back. So the time that you want it to be answered the most, you’re still getting silence. There’s never a satisfaction there,’ she added.

While she admits there may not be growth and change in her personal life by the end of the series, she insists she shouldn’t be counted out as a businesswoman. 

‘I think she is a killer long-term. I feel like she’s the most like Logan so she in the end, inevitably, will end up to be a killer. Maybe more than Kendall is,’ she said.

Heads up: When asked about the death of Shiv’s father Logan Roy, Snook revealed the cast had been, ‘given a heads up’ that the death was happening

Killer: ‘I think she is a killer long-term. I feel like she’s the most like Logan so she in the end, inevitably, will end up to be a killer. Maybe more than Kendall is,’ she said