‘The White Lotus' critiques luxury tourism while also promoting it with partnerships
When it premiered back in 2021, 'The White Lotus' was a sharp class satire aimed at skewering high-end tourism and the elite one-percenters willing to pay $9,000 a night to relax. Written and directed by Mike White, the darkly comic mystery followed the entitled guests and beleaguered employees at a luxurious Maui hotel over the course of an increasingly tense week.
A destination that was supposed to be a refuge from the world's problems instead became a microcosm for them, a place where the class divide and legacy of American imperialism were on vivid display. 'The White Lotus,' which was filmed its first season on location at the Four Seasons in Maui, somehow made an exclusive resort seem like a toxic pressure cooker. Working there was not just soul-crushing, it could even kill you.
Season 2, a bedroom farce set at a gorgeous beachfront resort in Sicily, looked at sex, money and power. Both installments lampooned the wealthy and depicted people dying under tragic circumstances in picturesque locations. And perhaps counterintuitively, both seasons led to a tourism boom in the filming locations. Somehow, a show that sharply critiqued luxury travel also functioned as a glossy advertisement for it.
This contradiction is even more pronounced in Season 3 of 'The White Lotus,' which premiered on HBO last month. Set on the island of Koh Samui in Thailand, the latest installment follows tradition by opening with a dead body. But it also explores new themes, including the clash between Western materialism and Eastern spirituality, particularly Buddhism. This season's fictional White Lotus is known for its wellness program. Guests are encouraged to put away their phones for the duration of their stay and avail themselves of offerings like yoga, meditation and massage.
Hollywood movies and TV shows tend to focus on the more decadent aspects of Thai culture — from the all-night Full Moon Party to sex tourism in Bangkok. The team behind 'The White Lotus' wanted to showcase other sides of the country.
'Obviously that exists here, but it doesn't define Thai culture,' executive producer David Bernad said in a phone interview last month from Bangkok, where the show was having a splashy local premiere attended by its cast, including Thai-born K-pop star Lalisa Manobal, a.k.a. Blackpink's Lisa, who stars as a worker at the hotel. 'What we attempted to do is depict Thailand in an authentic way — the beauty of the people and the culture — in a way that hopefully brings more positive interest back to Thailand.'
The season was made in partnership with the Tourism Authority of Thailand and the Four Seasons, which once again served as a filming location for the series. The government of Thailand also offered generous tax rebates to the production. HBO collaborated with a slew of brands to create an array of 'White Lotus'-inspired products, including $98 scented candles, $48 sunscreen, $325 overnight bags, $725 dresses and $4.50 flavored coffee creamers. Despite its often dark themes and cynical take on humanity, the show clearly has become an aspirational marketing vehicle for brands across the spectrum. Why, exactly, is a show about terrible people behaving badly (and dying) so appealing to these companies?
'I genuinely don't know the answer. It's a very weird thing,' Bernad said. 'It's surreal, knowing that the original construction of the show was so intimate and small. For me, it still feels strange that anyone is paying attention.'
Given what a pop culture juggernaut 'The White Lotus' has become, it is easy to forget it was conceived as a stopgap — a show that could be made quickly and safely in a single, isolated location during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, when HBO was in desperate need of fresh programming.
The original plan was to film in Australia, where strict lockdowns helped keep the pandemic in check. When that proved too difficult, Hawaii became the obvious choice. The setting offered stunning natural beauty but also rich themes to explore, particularly American colonialism and the plight of Native Hawaiians.
Similarly, Season 2 was almost set in France but wound up in Sicily after a scouting trip to Taormina, where a tour guide told them the legend behind the decorative moor's head statues found in the region that became a motif in the series. 'That was the kickoff to Mike wanting to write this bedroom farce season about sexual politics,' Bernad said.
Season 3 was always envisioned as an 'exploration of Eastern versus Western philosophy,' Bernad said. But Plan A was to film in Japan, a country where they'd been keen to make something for years. Largely as a courtesy to HBO, White and Bernad also visited Thailand. (White had negative associations with Koh Samui in particular because he'd been sequestered on the island after getting eliminated from 'The Amazing Race.')
But ultimately they were charmed by the country and its people. White also was struck by a fit of inspiration when he came down with bronchitis while in the city of Chiang Mai. He was treated with potent steroids and 'hallucinated the entire season,' Bernad said. 'Honestly, the next day, we were scouting in the van, and he told me about his dream. It's basically what we shot — his steroid-induced dream.'
Relocating the show to Thailand, where more than 90% of the population is Buddhist, 'allowed us to explore Buddhism as a religion and a philosophy,' Bernad said. One of their creative goals was presenting a more nuanced version of Thai culture than is typical of Western media. 'It's usually like 'The Hangover Part II,' exploiting the darker side of Bangkok. But that's not what we set out to do,' he said.
One of the characters this season, Piper Ratliff (Sarah Catherine Hook), is a religious studies major who has dragged her wealthy Southern family to Thailand so that she can interview a Buddhist monk for her thesis. Her spiritual curiosity is baffling to her family, who are skeptical of the many wellness offerings at the hotel.
Koh Samui is 'like detox island,' a place well-heeled tourists come to engage in practices they associate with Buddhism but are often a mishmash of different spiritual traditions, said Brooke Schedneck, a religious studies professor at Rhodes College whose research centers on Buddhism and religious tourism in Thailand. 'Everyone coming off the plane [in Koh Samui] has their yoga mats,' she said. Places like the fictional White Lotus 'draw on this idea of Thailand as a Buddhist place but [offer] wellness options that don't necessarily connect to Buddhism.' (You'd never practice yoga in a Buddhist temple, for instance.)
'I think it's really funny how ... most of them are going to this wellness resort, and then they're like, 'I don't want to do wellness. Why do I have to do this?'' Schedneck said of the hotel's spoiled guests. 'It shows the individualistic, Western mindset of 'I want to do whatever I want.''
Yet the contradiction between East and West may not be as stark as one might assume. Some Westerners wrongly assume that because Buddhism is so prevalent in Thailand, it means people are less interested in material things. 'The idea that Buddhism can encompass and encourage wealth is something that's difficult for people to grasp,' Schedneck said.
For the Four Seasons, 'The White Lotus' has been an undeniably powerful marketing tool — despite the death and dissolute behavior that goes on at the resorts in the series. The formal partnership, launched ahead of Season 3, means the company can use 'White Lotus' IP and do branded activations, including poolside cabanas and viewing parties, at its resorts. The Four Seasons also recently announced a 20-day excursion in which guests will travel aboard the company's private jet to the show's three filming locations.
As part of its marketing research, the company conducts monthly surveys with high-net-worth individuals. The questionnaire now includes questions about 'The White Lotus.' Of the millennials surveyed, 88% were aware of both brands, and 71% said they were highly likely to visit properties featured in the series.
'We know that if we pick the right show, and if the hotel has been featured in the right way, it has a huge business impact, and it's the best PR we can do,' said Marc Speichert, executive vice president and chief commercial officer at the Four Seasons. He is already seeing a surge of online interest in the Koh Samui property: Visits to the site are up nearly 600% over the same time last year.
'Everybody knows that this is obviously a fiction. The White Lotus isn't the Four Seasons, per se. It just uses the hotel as a backdrop. The PR that we're getting is about how incredible the hotel looks,' Speichert said. (He said that characters like Belinda, played by Natasha Rothwell in Seasons 1 and 3, and Valentina, played by Sabrina Impacciatore in Season 2, reflect the kind of people who do work at the Four Seasons.)
Previous seasons of 'The White Lotus' led to a surge of visitors to Maui and Sicily. In Thailand, where tourism is a major industry, an influx would be welcome. The country saw 35 million foreign visitors last year, according to the Tourism Authority of Thailand, which aims to increase that number to 40 million in 2025.
'Thailand acting as the setting of 'The White Lotus' Season 3 allows us to reach a truly global audience, and offers a unique opportunity to showcase Thailand's breathtaking landscapes, rich culinary scene, vibrant culture, natural beauty and, most importantly, the people and the warmth of Thai hospitality,' said Chompu Marusachot, director of the TAT's New York office.
An increase in visitors would be an economic boon for Thailand, but there is also concern about the potential environmental impact more visitors would have on the country, particularly Koh Samui, which already struggles with a shortage of fresh water and an overflowing landfill, according to reports from local residents. Other Hollywood productions offer cautionary tales: 'The Beach,' released in 2000, helped turn Maya Bay on the island of Ko Phi Phi Leh into a major tourist destination that received as many as 5,000 visitors a day. Because of the resulting pollution, an estimated 80% of the coral in the bay was destroyed. Authorities eventually closed the beach for several years and now restrict access. HBO did not provide comment when asked about the environmental impact of filming 'The White Lotus' in Koh Samui.
But for Bernad, making the series in Thailand taught him the importance of treading lightly. 'You have to come in with a humility that you're not imposing your way of production,' he said. 'You're learning from the local crew and producers, and adjusting to their needs.' Good advice for producers — and tourists — alike.
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