Before HBO’s Succession captivated global audiences with the ruthless exploits of the Roy family, ABC explored ultra-wealthy dynastic dysfunction in 2007 with Dirty Sexy Money.
Led by Peter Krause as conflicted lawyer Nick George and Donald Sutherland as patriarch Tripp Darling, the cult drama chronicled the chaotic secrets of New York’s elite. While the series was cancelled after just two seasons, Krause remains adamant that his show had the chops to outshine modern television heavyweights.
The Darlings vs. The Roys: Peter Krause Claims His Drama Wins
Reflecting on his career in a retrospective interview with Esquire, Krause said Darlings would emerge victorious in an all-out war between the billionaire dynasties.
The actor credited the show’s enduring quality to its formidable ensemble, emphasizing the brilliance of his late co-star Donald Sutherland. “I loved working with Donald Sutherland, Donald was an incredibly facile actor who made every take different,” Krause shared. “We had a blast for the two years that we worked together.”
Crucially, Krause argued that Dirty Sexy Money was simply a victim of the wrong medium and the wrong era. Hamstrung by broadcast television standards, network censors, and the disruptive 2007–2008 writers’ strike, the series never had the creative runway to reach its peak.
“I think that if we’d been on a cable network at the time or on a streaming service, I think that Dirty Sexy Money could have really taken off,” Krause asserted.
Could Dirty Sexy Money Have Beaten Succession?
On paper, both shows mined identical thematic territory of an obscenely wealthy, corrupt patriarch presiding over dysfunctional adult heirs whose lives are shielded by an exasperated moral fixer. However, the critical reception and creative execution between the two projects could not be further apart.
Dirty Sexy Money holds a modest 68% critic approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, with reviewers at the time viewing it as a lavish, melodramatic primetime soap rather than high-art satire. In contrast, Succession is widely heralded as one of the greatest television achievements in history, boasting a 95% overall rating, universal critical adoration, and a historic haul of 19 Primetime Emmy Awards.
Where Succession treated dynastic wealth with Shakespearean gravity and razor-sharp cynicism, Dirty Sexy Money leaned into glossy camp, illicit affairs, and heightened procedural intrigue.
Even if Dirty Sexy Money debuted directly on modern streaming without network constraints, it is difficult to imagine it surpassing Succession. A cable or streaming release certainly would have unlocked darker tones, explicit indulgence, and deeper creative freedom for Sutherland and Krause.
Yet Succession‘s cultural dominance was fueled by extraordinary comedic realism, tragic familial trauma, and world-class writing that redefined contemporary drama, qualities that elevated the Roys into a singular cultural titan no standard network melodrama could easily dethrone.
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