Patrick Schwarzenegger on his breakout "White Lotus" role
"Every time I'm out in, like, nature, that's kind of where I like to do my prayers or gratitude list," said Patrick Schwarzenegger. These days he is counting his blessings, even though the role he was recently blessed with is anything but reverent. He plays the much-talked-about (and much-hated) Saxon Ratliff, the eldest son of a wealthy family visiting Thailand, in the latest incarnation of HBO's "The White Lotus."
Saxon is a chiseled car crash – a sex-obsessed, protein shake-chugging bro who is so irredeemably into his own masculinity, he offends even his own sister. How do you even audition for a part like that?
Schwarzenegger says he was only given a short sentence describing Saxon's excitable personality: "The wording was that ''He flirted with anything.' So, I just took the first few seconds and just kind of, you know, stared at the camera in a loving way."
Did he have any reservations? "Yes, I was worried," he said. "I didn't want him to come off as just this one-note character."
And early on he didn't even know yet just how sexually awkward things were going to get. "When I was auditioning, they had said, 'Are you okay with, know, performing things sexually? Are you okay being nude at times?'" Schwarzenegger recalled. "So, I knew an idea of where it could go. I didn't know to what extent the show would go."
To watch a trailer for Season 3 of "The White Lotus," click on the video player below:
The series' creator, Mike White, has spent three seasons pushing the envelope, writing exotic whodunits that, along the way, skewer the rich and privileged vacationing at White Lotus resorts all around the world – a world he knew Patrick probably understood. Schwarzenegger said, "There was a joke because he was always like, 'You don't look like you're rich. You're not walking rich. Aren't you a Schwarzenegger? Aren't you a Kennedy? Aren't you rich in real life? You don't look like you're rich at all!'"
The show's first season, set in Hawaii, debuted during the pandemic in 2021, and it hit Schwarzenegger and his family head-on. "It was me, Abby, my fiancée, and my mom," he said. "We lived together, us three, during the pandemic. So, you can imagine how fun that was! And then they were always like, 'You need to be in the show, you need to audition, this is perfect.'"
His fiancée is fashion model Abby Champion; his mom is journalist and member of the Kennedy clan Maria Shriver; and his dad, well, that goes without saying.
Arnold Schwarzenegger has said that he didn't recognize his son in the role. "It would be a little bit alarming if he did recognize a lot of those characteristics!" Patrick laughed.
His best friends are his family. They're also his greatest fans. When he got the part, they were tears all around. Patrick Schwarzenegger has emerged from "The White Lotus," as a standout among standouts – the kind of breakout he hopes will put to rest any suspicions about nepotism.
In a recent father-and-son chat on Variety's "Actors on Actors," Arnold Schwarzenegger said, "To me, the name Schwarzenegger always meant a big plus."
Patrick revealed that he worried his name might get in the way: "There were times earlier in my career where I was wondering, Does it makes sense to go under some sort of alias? Does it make sense to go under a different name?"
"Well, I'm glad that you kept the name, 'cause now I can take credit," Arnold said. "My son! The apple doesn't fall far from the tree."
Patrick idolized his dad growing up, spending time on movie sets that became his playground. By the time he was 13, he was on his own sets, but he says he rarely brought up his dad. "I mean, I always know that there's, you know, my last name, there's connections, there's, you know, things that are gonna help me, but I wanted to try to take a different path than that."
He did, however, follow his dad's path on matters of money – how to run a business, how to create a brand. "My dad put me in charge of his memorabilia when I was 10," said Patrick. "And so, I would take these different photos of him, you know, at Muscle Beach, and we would frame them. I took a replica of the Conan swords and get him to sign them, and I would sell them for $10,000 a pop. It was all for nonprofit. I didn't make any money, but it was to understand how to sell."
He actually majored in business as USC, starting college just about a year after his parents had left the California Governor's office. Politics has been in his genes, after all – and so has the idea of public service. His grandfather, Sargent Shriver, was the founding director of the Peace Corps. His grandmother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, founded the Special Olympics.
Asked if he's thought about going into politics himself, Patrick replied, "I think it was instilled in us to find ways to give back at an early age. It doesn't have to be through public office, to find ways to give back."
Through it all, his focus on acting remained pretty singular. He spent a decade in acting class, building a resume one part at a time, recently acting opposite Colin Firth in the HBO mini-series, "The Staircase." That, he said, "was the first time that the people in the industry were able to see me in a dramatic role. ... Before, people maybe didn't take me serious. They didn't know if I was really, you know, in it for the long haul, was I really working on my craft?"
WATCH: "The White Lotus" clip: Saxon and Timothy
In this scene, Saxon Ratliff (Patrick Schwarzenegger) demands to know from his dad, Timothy (Jason Isaacs) whether everything is OK at the office. [Spoiler alert: Everything is NOT OK at the office.]
He hopes his next role will be a character with a few less character flaws than Saxon Ratliff. That said, Patrick Schwarzenegger would happily check back into the White Lotus anytime Mike White asks. "I said, if you don't hire me again, I'll come and be the head of craft services," he said. "I'll come and hire me as your scouting location guy because I just want to come in and be part of the journey."
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Story produced by Reid Orvedahl. Editor: Lauren Barnello.
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