Billions (TV Series)

Succession (2022)

Maggie Siff: Wendy Rhoades

Quotes 

• Wendy Rhoades : [approaches a fireplace carrying her unfinished manuscript, rips page from the manuscript and tosses them into the fire]  This wasn't to free my ego. It was to let it run loose. I thought I would show them all who they were. And who I was: better than them. Higher on the food chain. Evolved.

  [adds pages to the fire] 

  Wendy Rhoades : Now I see it. Where it would lead. I can't do it. I can't... take that ride. In the end, it's a ride that only leads to needing more.

  [adds final pages to the fire, deep sigh] 

  Wendy Rhoades : Which is exactly what I don't need.

  Daniel : [takes Wendy's hand]  And now you're ready... to take refuge.

• Daniel : And you're asking me to read this book?

  Wendy Rhoades : I don't know what I'm asking.

  Daniel : You do. Now let yourself tell me.

  Wendy Rhoades : I don't think of myself as a fearful person or a particularly strategic thinker.

  Daniel : As to the first, the job of living is the job of understanding that fear. As to the second... this, right here, is the place we give up the lies we tell ourselves about who we are.

  Wendy Rhoades : I said something so similar to somebody recently. But, shit, yes. Daniel, yes. It applies here too. I did something that was both strategic and driven by fear today. I engineered a way to distract the subjects of the book with the book itself. That way, they would lobby me about how they were portrayed instead of if they'd only heard about it, trying to get me not to publish it.

  Daniel : So preying on their fear while giving in to your own.

  Wendy Rhoades : I'd like to tell myself that's not the case.

  Daniel : Have you considered the other choice? Not publishing?

  Wendy Rhoades : You think I shouldn't publish?

  Daniel : No. I'm not sharing that opinion. I'm asking a different question. What would it feel like to hold back?

  Wendy Rhoades : It feels... writing it felt like letting the bile out. Like coming clean. Like a chance to redeem not only myself, but the people who do this work and the people who want to.

  Daniel : Or is this the performance of all that? Of letting go of the need for power and influence and money while still feeding all those same needs. Are you finally putting those temptations to bed? Or are you fueling them?