Brian Cox says Jeremy Strong shouldn't have agreed to New Yorker profile: "In a sense, he got hoisted by it, and I think it was unfortunate"

Deadline

"It was Jeremy’s idea, the whole article," Cox tells Deadline of his Succession co-star while promoting his memoir. "He pushed for it, and you know, and people kept warning him about it. In a sense, he got hoisted by it, and I think it was unfortunate. I think he should never had gone down that road because playing Kendall has put him in a very vulnerable position." How? "Because he does what he does and he does it brilliantly, but it’s also exhausting. Particularly exhausting for him, but it’s also exhausting for the rest of us from time to time. But we weather it because we love him and because the result is always extraordinary, what he does, but at the same time, there is the double-edged sword that goes with it. Let me tell you, I have such respect for Jeremy as an actor, and I just wish him well. I think he lives in a lot of pain. I mean, he creates the pain in the role he plays. That doesn’t necessarily help, but he does. … There is a certain amount of pain at the root of Jeremy, and I just feel for that pain. I think that he puts himself in vulnerable positions and with that New Yorker article, he placed himself in a very, very vulnerable position, and I think that he didn’t need to do that."

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• Brian Cox can't defend Logan Roy, but he can identify with him: "I don't defend Logan in any way," Cox tells Fresh Air. "One of the jobs as an actor is we cannot judge our characters. He is a misanthrope (who) is very disappointed with the human experiment." Cox says he can relate to the anger his character feels: "I have, personally, a lot of anger in myself, partly because of my background."