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The Life & Unauthorised Biography Of Lachlan Murdoch… by Paddy Manning

I was just strolling the chilly Nybroplan pier in Stockholm and heard on the wind, a familiar, wiry, fast talking American accent. I recognised it immediately as the voice of was Roman Roy.

The streets where empty, he was walking my direction and breezed straight past me with his family desperate not to make eye contact with someone who had recognised him as the heir apparent.

I guess he was in town celebrating the takeover of his fathers media empire.

Contrary to popular opinion, it was not the real life Lachlan Murdoch, Kendall Roy who who has succeeded to the throne, but his cynical apolitical bother, Roman.

According to the biographer of Lachlan Murdoch, the guest on this episode of the podcast Paddy Manning. Rupert’s eldest son, Lachlan, has more in common with Roman Roy than the true ‘oldest boy’ Kendall. Roman and Lachlan share a cynical view of politics where right or wrong or left or right isn’t important, rather winning at business is all that matters.

This is a line from the podcast…

‘For Rupert, power was always more important than business. He would make decisions motivated by what would give him the most power (sounds a big like Logan anybody?) whereas Lachlan (Roman Roy) is primarily motivated by the business outcome. What get’s more ratings. What generates more revenue. Lachlan is less interested in power than he is with business success.‘

Jump into the conversation (time stamps navigation) straight to Paddy’s explanation for why he thinks Lachlan Murdoch is Roman Roy.

This podcast is as well couched in Lachlan’s amazing life, brilliantly captured by Paddy Manning.

#138 of ‘The Curious Worldview Podcast’ with Paddy Manning.

Forward this email to all of your mates who you talk about Succession with.

Here is a transcript of the opening exchange from the conversation…

Ryan
Okay, Patty. So I wanted to open up by asking actually just directly, what is your opinion of Lachlan Murdoch? Because my reading of the book was that it wasn't necessarily overly critical or judgmental of him as a character. And I definitely came into it thinking critical of the man's personality, his decisions and so forth. So I just wanted to actually ask you directly, what was your opinion of him as a bloke?

Paddy Manning
Well, that's kind of an open-ended question and I suppose, yeah, I don't see my job in writing a biography of Lachlan Murdoch to be a critic of Lachlan Murdoch. I'm trying to get people to give people the information that they can make their own judgments about him. And so I approached it not as a, you know, a bit of opinion or commentary or, you know, much less writing a sort of a big long anti-Murdoch rant, I approached it as a job of trying to investigate, I suppose, who he is. And I think to do that, you have to go in with an open mind, and I think you have to try and stick to the facts, and I think you have to do all the things that an ethical journalist does, and be fair and balanced and accurate, and give, you know, a right

Do find out about him and try and you know get all sides of the story So that kind of that kind of hard work it would have been very easy to just write down You know my opinions of the guy and not and not do any of the hard yards Which is really did the research Involved in in trying to understand what has shaped him and and

and yeah who he is and where he might be taking this media empire that has such a huge influence globally and you know I have opinions about all aspects of Lachlan Murdoch. I have opinions about his you know character, about his business, acumen, about his politics and those opinions I've got to say are changing all the time.

Paddy Manning
Even since I've written the book a lot has happened. You know, so I'm not wedded to any of them. I don't put a huge amount of store in my own opinion. I could respond to your question a million different ways. I think one of the key takeouts that I intended for people to, you know, get out of my book was that Lachlan is quite different to his father. Rupert Murdoch has been a kind of colossus in a way. He did found from the basis of one small newspaper business that he inherited from his father in Adelaide in South Australia. He founded from there, he founded the world's first national global media.

Empire and people are quite familiar generally with the Rupert Murdoch story but I think there's a great tendency to tar all of the Murdochs, you know, just think they're all kind of interchangeable and yet Lachlan is quite different to his father and you know we can get into some of the ways that he's different but one of the key things that I think is different is that

Lachlan after spending two years looking at and interviewing people close to him and interviewing people opposed to him and doing as much research as I could do. I don't think that Lachlan is quite the kind of kingmaker that his father or grandfather were.

That's not to say that he wants to walk away from political power, but I think if you look at the investments that he's made or driven over his 25 years since he was really actively involved in the business in a significant way, and including the decade when he went out by himself, I think the things that he tends to get interested in and invest in, are not the things that his father pursued. Rupert pursued the Times of London. Rupert pursued the Wall Street Journal. Rupert created the Australian, the first national broadsheet. These are huge media assets that generate significant political power. And Rupert's business model, as one academic described it, Manuel Castells, has been to trade of, you know,

political favour for regulatory favour and that's been a very successful kind of formula for decades. Yeah but Lachlan Murdoch, I think his investments, whether it's digital real estate with realestate.com.au or whether it's commercial radio in Australia where he's made a lot of money out of Nova, a company he bought off the Daily Mail and General Trust.

and or you know his current push into sports betting, these are not things that generate political power and I think that shows that Lachlan's motivations are quite different to Rupert's.

Ryan
You mentioned so much has happened since it reads like such a terrific drama, the whole story of his life…

……. continue the conversation with the podcast here.