Logan Roy (Brian Cox) is in the hospital after suffering from a hemorrhagic stroke, and the fate of his multibillion-dollar corporation is in limbo. His four children, Kendall (Jeremy Strong), Shiv (Sarah Snook), Roman (Kieran Culkin), and Connor (Alan Ruck) are oscillating between genuine concern for their father’s health, and genuine concern for where they’ll land in the pecking order of power. In the midst of alliances and high-stakes decision making, Roman and Shiv get into an argument and have a slap fight. Their father is on the brink of death with his global empire hanging in the balance, and his two very grown and very wealthy children devolve into an adolescent scrap.

That’s the tone of Succession: a dark comedy grafted onto the framework of a Greek tragedy.

Succession follows the Roys, the family behind one of the biggest media conglomerates in the world. As it often goes when power, money, and family are in the mix, things get personal as the Roy children attempt to wrest control of the company out of their father’s unwilling hands. Succession could have gone the way of a traditional drama, but the tone and how it’s shot take it to a level of storytelling that’s less soap opera and more authentic.

“The key note to me is trying to be true,” Armstrong says. “Especially if you’re writing about rich and powerful people, if you strip away comedy and anything ludicrous, then you give people too much [seriousness]. All powerful people make foolish decisions and end up in humiliating and embarrassing situations, as well as wielding their power. So I feel like you need to include that bit to be true.”

In 2010, a screenplay from Armstrong about media magnate Rupert Murdoch and his family wound up on The Black List, an annual industry survey of the most popular yet unproduced scripts circulating in Hollywood. That script became the inspiration for Succession. The concept of a family jockeying for control of a billion-dollar company could, in essence, fall to a number of industries including banking, tech, etc. However, Armstrong stayed true to Murdoch’s grip on media as the stage for the Roy family drama.

“It’s about the relationship with the media, and how a small number of people and families have such a disproportionate effect on the world we live in,” Armstrong says. “It’s absolutely crucial. I wouldn’t pitch this show about another industry or area.”