Transcript of Ep. 2: “Special Treatments” with Tayme Thapthimthong, Lalisa Manobal and Sam Nivola

I'm on vacation with my family. I don't know her.

Her friend is Jacquelyn Lemon.

Who's that?

She's an actress. She's famous.

Wish they'd be impressed. Actresses are all basically prostitutes, if they're lucky.

Am I right? Hello, and welcome to the White Lotus official podcast, companion to Season 3.

I'm Gia Tolentino.

And I'm Josh Beermann.

I'm here to warn you that if you haven't watched episode 2 of Season 3, watch it right now before listening to this, because we will spoil every single beat of the episode for you.

Yes. Although this may be the last warning, because by now you probably know how podcasts work. Yeah. And later on in this episode, we're going to be speaking with Tame Taptim Tong and Lalisa Manival, who play Guy Talk and Mouk, and Sam Nivola, who plays the youngest ratliff, Lachlin.

Josh, I have a question for you before we get into all of this. This is my toxic sex in the city, assertive behavior question. After following these characters for two episodes, who are you? Are you still Gaugins?

Yeah, I'm now stronger in the Gaugins direction. When he gets into the treatment center and is there in this spiritual repartee with the guru there.

I don't need to detach.

I'm already nothing.

Even nothing can be an illusion you tell yourself.

That's when I was like, Oh, yeah, now I get it. That's where I fit in. Who are you identifying with?

I'm lessening on my Chelsea identification. It's really the party girl aspect of that I connect with, but she's a little bit more naive and sweet in this episode than I am necessarily. I, unfortunately, am beginning to identify more with the three women who are constantly talking shit about each other.

Where do you land in that trio?

Oh, God. Well, unfortunately, I'm not a lorry. Never been a lorry. Just kidding. I probably have been a lorry at times in my past. It is one of the women that are eager to be the alpha. This episode is called Special Treatments, and it's once again written and directed by Mike White. The episode starts where the last episode ends, which is after Carrie Coon has gone to bed. Kate and Jacquelyn, Leslie Pipp and Michelle Monahan, can really get into the gossip. The dynamic on display between these three women is that everything that they are doing when it's the three of them together is completely fake. Then as soon as one of them leaves, they snap into the mode of truth-telling.

They probably console themselves by believing that their gossip is actually a form of caring because they're talking about, Oh, poor things. Went through this troubled time. But it's not really constructive, compassionate. Because they don't do anything. There's no action taken. And then later, the other leg of the stool is present when it's Laurie and Kate.

Talking about Michelle Monningham.

Yeah, exactly. Then it seemed like she picks up that they're talking about her explicitly, right? They're trying to basically undo that façade brick by brick in the conversation they were having just before.

Then the whole thing with the husband Yes. There's something weird there, right? She goes on and on. They're so in love. They're addicted to each other. But I mean, are they ever even in the same city? I don't think they ever see each other. Yeah, and now we When we just have to wait for the shit talk about Leslie Pipp. I can't wait to hear what that is. But it's like you find out when they're talking about Jacquelyn, that it's like both of those women have been profoundly sexually unfulfilled for a long time, and you find it out just in the way that they talk.

Right. Also, I mean, I feel... Again, I feel like it's difficult to watch, but it's also I think the writing is sympathetic to the character. They're not malevolent. They're all doing... It's all self-preservation, right? Because you're feeling these So you have these instincts of comparison and your emotional hackles are up, but based on your friend's success or not. And so there's this compulsion, basically, to try to then measure yourself and rebalance it by having your side gossip or introducing a negative thought about the other friend to the third one, right? It's like this natural self-preservation. I also love their interaction with Fabian, the hotel director, when he comes over and reveals that he, too, would love to perform. No, no. Yeah? Come on. I can't.

That would be crazy. I wouldn't dare. Come on, get up there. No. I'm the boss. So maybe, maybe one day.

I'm obsessed with him. I'm obsessed with him when he drifts away to what you know is a montage in his head of him Yeah. You know, like Follia, just him taking the stage in a grand review with feathers and diamonds everywhere.

Emerging out of a giant clamshell. Yeah, exactly. Also, I am very thrown off by the fact that this is the same actor who plays Rudolf hosts the Auschwitz Commandant in Zone of interest. Wow.

His range.

Yeah. So I'm excited to see where Fabian winds up. So we have also a scene with Munch and I talk, the Thai staff.

He really blew it there.

I know. He pulled the fish hook before it was baited. He didn't even... He basically asked her to marry him elliptically without any context or preface, as she said, We've never been on a date. Oh, but obviously, everybody's going to be shipping these two.

I know. Well, but then he wins her sympathy again because there is a actually truly surprising interlude in here. With the robbery. With the robbery where Valentin is distracting Guy talk at the gate.

Yes. It appears like there's a deception operation here so that a car can get in and there's mass dudes running with guns and steal.

They just steal some jewelry. I'm like, That's not that much stuff. You didn't even get a cash register. It's never established that that really is expensive.

It must be expensive. I guess it must be expensive. I guess that's the assumption. She really wants that snake choker. I know.

We're going to get that back. That's just going to reoccur. But we got gun. I mean, I was surprised that we physically saw a gun. I was expecting to not see the gun until the last episode. I mean, who knows if it's the same gun, et cetera, but I enjoyed it when we saw a gun. But so on the way back out- You get pistol-whipped.

Yeah. You gasped. You were like, Oh, no. Did I?

Yeah. You were like, Oh, no. I'm not squamish about violence, but I hate the sound of something colliding with a head. But clearly, Mouk is attracted to more aggressive signs of masculinity. She's interested in the dirtbag bodyguards or whatever. She is giving all of the classic signals of this nice man is too gentle to me, and I don't like that.

It's interesting. Quick side note, that guy, the real guy, is like a Special Forces. Really? It's like a military guy. Really? Yeah. And you can tell. If you meet him, he's not like that character at all. That's so funny.

But once he is bandaged up, she comes to him and is like, I was so worried or whatever, right?

Yeah, I know. That's so sweet. Well, I'm hoping for them. I was struck by something with the robbery. What happens just after is the classic White Lotus dinner seating, which still remains much more dramatic than the robbery had just happened. You're like, Oh, okay, I guess so. I don't know. I've seen that before. What's going to happen dinner. I was even thinking about how the show works in this novelistic way of making the rounds through all the characters over and over again, and each time adding a little bit of layer of personality and so on. So we had the Kibiquo, maybe escort, and Gary/Greg. Who met the matchmaking service in Dubai. And the four of them at dinner. What about you?

What do you do?

Well, the same thing that you do, Gary, this and that.

There are a lot of people here who do this and that.

Right. In which Chelsea and Rick get to feel like a functional and loving couple compared to the other two.

She's young and fun like me, and he's old and grumpy like you.

I'm just Are you kidding?

I'm glad that you made a friend.

By the way, that sex scene, surprising.

Yeah.

But also that it seemed very genuine and tender. Then I was, And then I was, again, I was like, all you want to be do if you're wounded, all you want to be do is taken care of by an open-hearted fawn of a woman. Totally. And so that's what he... Then it makes... Now I get like, this is why they're together.

And occasionally he lets her, and then she feels happy about it, and then he obviously feels happy about it. But he doesn't always let her. Yeah, right.

Even not sexually. She throws out the tantric offer at the beginning, and he doesn't go for it. And it's only when he really feels, I guess, vulnerable. Has been brought low by the meditation session. Yes, exactly. That he's open to receive her.

And then the continued psychosexual horror show that is Patrick Sportzenegger. He has gotten a boner during a massage. I mean, I'm not going to fault him for that, but is mad that nothing to it.

What?

Aren't they all supposed to be a little special special? Saxon, stop it.

It's interesting. I mean, Saxon is this very timely rearticulation of just pure American male id. He's like Gordon Gecko. He's like this from Wall Street.

But fresh out of Delta, whatever it done to. Yeah, right.

Exactly.

But what do I want, I guess?

Pussy?

Money, freedom, respect? Get laid, get everything.

He's a ball of flame. His presence is just this unidirectional, really pansexual. It's really specifically masculine, but it's just like, he is just so horny and so aggressive. I mean, he's sexually harassing both of his siblings so hard. Do you know what I mean?

And his parents just giggle about it.

He's two seconds away from trying trying to see his younger brother's dick, just trying to be like, Okay, but how big is it when it's on? He's just like, Oh, he's so- That could be coming. Then his sister has found out when she is on this hammock situation in the water that I've never personally experienced and I'd really like to now.

Yeah, I was like, How do I have that in my house?

Yeah. It seems actually like we can't. I had that thought and I was like, Actually, I can't replicate this. It cannot be done. I need open ocean. But she finds out then from Lachland, the younger brother who's just been in a sensory deprivation tank, basically is asking, Are you a virgin? We've been talking about how you're hot, but you're not having sex. And understandably and rightfully so, the sister's like, What?

Why are you two discussing this?

Why are you talking about this? When we learn from Piper that she believes in God.

Don't you feel like that could just be wishful thinking? You want to feel something so you- It's real.

We don't know exactly in what presentation format, But my guess for her is that she is a recent convert to spirituality or something. She had such a strong… I mean, not that this is any of my business, but it was part I feel like she has had sex and she is redevoting her, that she is trying to deny the life of the flesh at the moment. She's trying to transcend the prison of one's body and identity. We'll see.

Some of the characters Because now we're seeing some leads as to what might happen, right? So Belinda.

Oh, I love Belinda's moment.

Yeah, clocks the hot bahad on- Pornchai? Yeah, on pornchize bod.

So how would you like me? On my back or on my stomach?

And she's like, on my stomach.

And he's like, I meant me. And then she also clocks Gary/ Greg at dinner, right?

I know. And it's such a good... I hadn't thought about her feelings that she would have. I mean, because at what point does she already know that Tanya is dead?

Right.

Does she know?

Or is she going to suddenly start sleething?

Right. Because I feel that she will feel an implicit alliance with Tanya, despite Tanya having configured herself as her enemy. It should be like the enemy of my enemy is my friend, but they're not going to form an alliance. Right. You just feel that.

Right.

Now I'm like, you know what, Greg, Gary, would you come back to a third White Lotus property? Would you associate yourself? Wouldn't you want to go down the other side of the hill to the different resort? Greg is courting danger.

It's true. I mean, how is he to know that Belinda is going to show up on her training mission.

There's no way he remembers her at all, right? No. There's no chance he remembers her, which I hope she uses to her advantage.

One thing I was struck by watching is that a lot of this episode is about performance. You have the the vocal performance at the dinner from the matron of the hotel. Then, of course, you have the three friends who are on their girls trip who are engaging in this ongoing self-performance for each other, which then drops when one of them is away.

Those three actors, when they are doing, having fun, but primarily in a way that's like, I'm performing a woman on vacation having fun. It was the best first. She was amazing, though.

Totally amazing.

You're amazing.

Oh, my God.

They're so profoundly self-conscious when they're around each other. And then the way it totally collapses and changes as soon as one of them leaves the room. It's amazing. It's amazing stuff.

It must be exhausting to put that on. Can you be performing all the time? But also that family, the Ratliff family, is a group performance of some kind. Piper's It's trying to opt out. Lachland's unsure. Saxon's the biggest. He wants to be the new leading man. And then the parents are orchestrating the whole thing. The edifice is already cracking, right? And we are able to see as viewers actually in the wings of that performance.

Well, and they make it clear in almost everything the parents say that the primary locus for them and what is a good family is this successful performance in edifice, right? You're all gorgeous and you come for money, so you have to be hyper vigilant, okay? It's like you have to not basically... You've got this beautiful facade, don't let it slip. Bizzly Bib. She has that line where she's like, well, you know what they say, the bigger the front, the bigger the back or whatever. This is an operative line for everyone, but especially that family. It's like it is core to their identity. You feel that these children have heard since they were little kids in perfect Christmas outfits posing for their perfect Christmas picture in front of a giant tree at a country club, that the virtue exists in the performance of that virtue. There is no sense of the internal unless it's what you're projecting.

Again, by the way, I was thinking about the prison of identity.

The therapist talks to Rick about.

And the therapist says the same thing to Rick. Meditation can bring relief to psychic pain. Meditation helps you see that the identity you've created brings you suffering. It reminded me that at the very beginning of White Lotus Season 1, when they're greeting the boat, Armand is there and they're all smiling, and he's there with the woman who later just gives birth in the middle of the hotel. She's a trainee, and he's saying, What you want to do is be nobody. You don't want to be too specific as a presence as an identity.

You want to be more generic.

Generic? Yes.

It's a Japanese ethos where we are asked to disappear behind our masks as pleasant interchangeable helpers.

He's just like, You just want to be a non-presence, not a person. So he's saying, deny your identity. Later, he throws that yoke off and rolls with his identity and he winds up dead. So I feel like there's a cautionary tale in the aspect of your identity. And it's now I see it running through the whole thing.

Right. And I think that here there will be this reinvention, recurrence thing that will be happening that's thematically consistent with the setting and Buddhism and whatever. And it's like, Rick, he is on his second, third, fourth iteration of a life, it feels like. There's that moment where he and Greg, who's still going by Gary, Tanya's Greg. It's like they talk about doing this and that. It's like every fucking White American is here for having done this and that.

He's like, It's a good business.

Yeah, exactly. And so it's like, Gary is trying to leave his life behind. Rick is trying to either leave something behind or step into a new version of himself. I feel like Piper is doing that. The Ratliff dad is trying to take the $10 million, the mere $10 million he got out of whatever fraud bribery situation went on in Brunei and try to leave it behind, but he can't. It's catching up with him.

Right. I think part of the idea of the show is that character is not destiny. Classic storytelling is character is destiny.

But I do think for most of the characters, I think they're tend to only... I I think that there are a couple of journeys per season that really cut at a strange angle against character's destiny. But mostly people end up where... Do you know what I mean? It's like everyone, there's something surprising happens to everyone in the course of their week at the White Lotus. But you know Jake Lacy is coming out of there, same guy, same wife. You know what I mean? But it is interesting to wonder who it's going to be, who it's going to be that's going to get out of the Ringer, who's... Right. By Converse, logic also, there is, I think, a line, and they would say, Oh, after you leave here, you'll be a whole new person.

But of course, the reality is that people go on vacation and they want to be the same person. They think they want to have something new, but they actually want to go to the hotel and come home and go back to their house and be the same as they were. And that's the the trap that most people would step into, I guess, if you were following the spiritual logic of the show, and then some people break out. Yeah, I wonder who that's going to be.

Now we're so excited to be joined by Lisa Manibal and Tame Tim Tong, who play our friends Mook and Guy Talk.

Welcome to the White Lotus Season 3 podcast, the companion show to the series. It's nice to have you both.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for having us. Thank you.

We've been loving watching this season. I wanted to ask you guys, Mike White always cast people from the country of the place where he's shooting. How did you guys feel in these roles as the primary Thai voices in the show, and what do you hope viewers take away about Thailand?

Well, I'm very, very grateful and very honored to get to represent Thailand as an actor in this beautiful role that Mike White has written for us. I really hope that we represent how sweet Thai people are because we try to make it as authentic as possible as Thai locals would be. They're pretty conservative people, but they are emotional and they are sweet people.

I'm just so grateful that they decide to do season 3 in Thailand. So it's a chance for us to showing our culture to the world, and I can't wait for them to watch this season.

What is interesting me watching it is that you guys have this lovely little romance, this courtship, but it's also both of the characters are very different from your real lives, right? You're an international pop star, and you come from a military background, and we know where your character is supposed to be unfamiliar with that world. What was that like playing these two different types of people from yourselves who are then interacting with each other?

I think for me, only the job is different. But me, my personal me and Muck, I think were in common a lot. Yeah, I didn't change. It's like she's ambitious. I'm ambitious as well. She's nice, lovely girl. I'm like that. I'm like that day to day. Yeah. For me, it was a challenge just to play a character that is very friendly, very shy.

Because all I played before this was I always played almost I'm a bad guy all the time. So a bit more serious roles. But this was very refreshing for me because I actually found out that, you know what? Actually, I do have a lot in common with guy talk because I am very shy around girls, especially. And so I could actually really use just my own character in that. But yeah, I think the one that was one of the most challenging is being so unfamiliar with like, When the thief are trying to leave and stuff, how I'm grabbing them, how I'm like... You have to not know what you're doing. Yeah, I don't know what to do. Yeah, because otherwise I'd do it differently for sure. If you wanted to immediately disarm them and take them down.

You could have secured that promotion to be the international bodyguard instead.

Yes. But it was fun.

The challenge was great. I had a lot of fun. I got to explore your sensitive side? I got to explore my sensitive side. I really enjoyed that.

How did you guys... The romance from the very first scene when the motorbike breaks down and you're making the joke, Give me 100 bot, or whatever. Yeah, Yeah, it's like it is truly such a sweet and lovely and totally... I was immediately invested from that. I wonder if you guys can talk about the relationship. We start the show and your characters have clearly had a slow burning little flirtation for a bit now and are still moving very slow despite Gaituk's desire to make it move faster by saying, your family already loves me, et cetera. But tell me about how you together conceived what this relationship and slow burning romance would be.

I think from Guy talk's point of view, he has been thinking about this for a while, almost planning out, how do I break this to her? And should I? Because that's what all the visitation at that lunch table was all about because I just felt like if I confess this to her, will this backfire on me? And she might be like, whoa, I did not think of you like that. You're like a brother to me or something, and just completely ruined the relationship. But yeah, so I think the way I thought in my head is that I've been staying up all night thinking about this. Should I ask her to lunch tomorrow? And then after I've asked her to lunch, I'm probably sitting in my booth and like, How do I convince her that this is a good idea? Okay, our parents know each other. I'm good friend.

He brought everything to convince her. Yeah. I mean, Muk and Kai Tong is family friends since they were young, so they grew up together in the island. And I think Mook never thought of Kai Tok in that romantic way. But when he confessed, she was like, Oh, maybe. Okay, let's try it out.

That's what you can do.

Yeah. Let's go on one date. Is he good enough for me? Yes.

Exactly. It is a forward move, though, because it's almost like a marriage proposal, but before you've been on a date, right? You're like, Well, I've laid it out. Here's my case. Our family We know each other. We work at the same place. Obviously, we're meant to be together. It's like a nervous energy. It was actually a very strong move.

I think it's close to how I am in real life sometimes.

That was the you coming out.

Something that could just be casual Hey, do you want to go on a date? I always make it such a big deal. Then sometimes I might make them a bit put off. It's happened many times.

Let's not talk about it.

I wonder if you all can talk about these are notoriously fun experiences for the cast, everyone on there together.

I wonder if you can just talk a little bit about what the actual filming experience was like and and maybe how the two of you supported and grounded each other as this important pair within the cast at large.

For me, this is my acting debut, so I don't know what to expect on set, to be honest. And I was super nervous on the first date with Tame as well. But Tame helped me a lot. And also Mike and our Thai producer as well. Everybody just being such a supportive role for me. And I really had a lot of fun while shooting. Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, all the way from the cast dinner where we first met, it was just amazing. The whole experience meeting all the actors I've seen in different movies and different shows before. And then Lisa coming in into the cast dinner. She made quite an entrance. Say more. Yeah. She made quite a very nice LV white dress. And then I was told by the producer, Lisa's here. Tame, come, come, come. And I was like, Oh, my God. Oh, my God. I don't know if I'm-Your girlfriend's here. Your girlfriend's here. Yeah. She was so great because she She broke the ice immediately, and we had a few drinks, and they sat us together for the dinner. After that, it was just very smooth. We would just have lunches together, dinners together, and just get to know each other and make the connection authentic.

Because we have to be on set together a lot. I want people to really believe that we're friends since we were young. Yeah. You feel it right away from the first encounter with the Moped.

Just how that is able to just tease each other.

How did you guys think about what each of these characters individually wants their life to look like in five years, 10 years? Did you have a sense of that? Does Gaitok want to be the bodyguard traveling internationally? You were saying that that MOOC is ambitious, right? Where do they see themselves post-White Lotus?

I think they're both ready to leave with White Lotus if they have a better opportunity. Yeah. Yeah.

I think especially Gaitok, I think he's in a little bit of denial. When she was, Oh, look at those guys. They get to travel the world. They get good money. And I thought, I like my job. Watching the car. Yeah, watching the car.

Yeah, it's great. You wander around.

But I think deep down inside, he did take what she said and really think about it. And he does slowly, I think, push himself more, or at least try. So, yeah, I mean, everything she says to him really has a lot of weight on it. Yeah, for sure.

Do you think that Munch wants to perform?

I look always love to perform.

Yeah.

If you tell her to sing tonight, okay.

Yeah. Okay.

She's ready. Yeah.

She crushes it on stage. Well, thank you guys so much for talking to us. We're loving this. Thank you very much.

I love your voice. It's so husband. I wish I could have that voice. I can't believe that I was just invited to join Blackpink.

Basically.

I'm going to start my intensive dance training tomorrow.

I thought you started this morning. You already started rehearsing some moves.

I started in preparation and hoped that she would say that to me. Okay, now to Sam Nivola, who plays Lachlin.

Here we have Sam Nivola, who plays Lachlin Ratliff. Welcome to the White Lotus Season 3 podcast. And nice to see you again.

It's nice to see you again and nice to meet you. I'm very happy to be here.

I want to know what the casting notice was like. What was the description of Lockheed?

I remember him being... I can't really remember exactly the description, but it was definitely something that I was used to being cast as. It was like, virginal, teen, really awkward. You know what I mean? I was like, God, this sounds nothing like me.

Don't pigeonhole me.

Yeah, exactly. But it's funny. It was one of the most straightforward casting processes I've ever been a part of. I mean, I've done jobs where I've had to audition for half a year and do 15 callbacks, and every time they're like, It's getting a little bit closer. It's getting a little... This one, it was like I had sent in a tape. He was like, I love it. Let's Zoom. And then we zoomed and I read a scene, and Then the next day, he was like, I love you. Let's do it.

You are the precise type of virginal team. Exactly.

I was like, Well, I'm flattered.

You're like, Are you sure I shouldn't play Saxon?

Yeah, I was like, I think I'm a little too muscly and masculine and cool.

I feel more like a Saxon.

Yeah, exactly. The only brutal part about it is that all of our callbacks, I spoke to Sarah, Katherine, and Patrick about this, too, were all the day after Christmas. We just had the most stressed stress-ridden Christmases where we were just shaking, waiting to do this thing. Then, of course, Mike is the nicest person in the world, and I wind up being totally fine, and we were stressing over nothing.

Your character is presented from the beginning as like, there are these two poles in terms of the older siblings, in terms of Piper and Saxon, and they are on two extremes in terms of aggression and gentleness, whatever you call it, masculinity, femininity. Did you have a sense of the character as truly in the at all, truly not knowing where he was going to land?

Well, I think that I go episode to episode. I switch back and forth with my allegenses between my brother and my sister. I really think it actually has nothing to do with what they're preaching, with the lifestyles that they like to live, and which one I think is better. I think it's more about which one of you at any given time will make me feel loved and supported. All my character wants, all Lachlin wants is a friend. You know what I mean? He's just a really, really deeply insecure, lonely person that like, Oh, you're offering me some affection or attention or love. I will do whatever you want for the next two days. You know what I mean? Oh, but then you're going to offer it as well? I'll do whatever you want. In a way, their two worldviews to their own chagrin hold no bearing on on my choices in terms of which one of them I ally with.

Yeah, it's interesting. It's really well set up with the very first scene getting to the villa where you're trying to decide which room to... Are you going to be a child still in sleep with your sister or be an an adult, and follow the male lineage of the family? The same with the decision with Chapel Hill and Duke, right? Yeah, exactly. Which way are you going?

Yeah. I feel like I relate to that whole thing a lot. I I have a specific experience, which is that I dropped out of college to become an actor, and I forced myself to grow up really fast. I was working professional jobs at the age of 17 and moved into my first apartment when I was 18, which are all amazing experiences that I'm incredibly lucky to have had the privilege to have. But it's growing up a little too fast It's just...

You chose adulthood or the extended adolescence of college.

Yeah, exactly. I think there's pros and cons to that. I think the moral of my character's story is that either way, whatever you choose in life, whatever path you choose, you're going to be fucked in some ways, and you're also going to really enjoy it in some ways, and there's no right way. That's how I feel. I really enjoy the way my life is panning out right now, and I feel really lucky for it. But part of me is also like, Man, I wish I had tailgated at a college party. I think everyone has a little bit of that push and pull. People want to grow up too fast or they want to stay a kid for too long.

Here in New York, you can just have both for about three decades before anybody tells you otherwise. We were talking about that in each season, there has been a gentle boy, a gentle moldable boy. There's Quinn season one, then Albie season two, and now you Yeah, I don't know. I mean, Loughlin is such a classic youngest. Yeah, totally. Was it fun to, I don't know, be the baby?

Yeah, it was totally fun to be the baby. It's funny having Parker was always really babying me in the scenes in a really sweet way. It's honestly comforting to have some amazing actress playing your mother be really loving and kind to you, especially when you're so far away from your real mother.

But there's like some... The one time that you really see Lachlin assert himself is when Victoria is rude to Leslie Bibb, when Parker Posey is rude to Leslie Bibb, and he's actually like, Mom, what are you doing? Yeah. How do you understand their relationship those two characters?

I think Victoria is just incredibly threatened. Her whole dynamic of our family is that she thinks everyone wants something from us. We have money. She thinks everyone is a leech and that our family is this unbreakable unit and that everyone wants to fuck us over somehow.

Yeah, it felt like that moment was Buckland, calling his mom out on like, this is actually...

The defense mechanism is overwhelming.

Yeah, exactly. I totally know that feeling when it's like one of your parents says something embarrassing, and you're just like, Guys, just fucking cut it out.

That never goes away. I think actually to the point you were making about the way that there's not a judgment about the character and the choices that you make and things can go right or wrong and it's okay. I think that for me holds true for the show in general, that that's probably what it's about. The show is very sympathetic to all the characters, even in their deepest mistakes. Insanities, yeah. I'm curious, is that something you felt coming from Mike as the show is being made? Totally.

I think you couldn't have said it better. Listen, at the At the end of the day, the show was written by Mike. My interpretation of it is that the characters are all versions of him, I think, and they're all splintered, exaggerated, heightened parts of Mike's soul. I think as a result, he really cares for all of them, and even if he writes them doing insane, fucked up, murderous things, they're still a part of him that he cares for. There's nothing worse than a movie with an anti-hero that you just actually hate because it's just boring. I think you can feel in the writing his love for all of the characters, even the most fucked up ones.

Lachlin is obsessed with tsunami videos. Definitely. Something I relate to. What do you make of that? Is he afraid that something is going to come undone?

I think definitely that the tsunami video obsession is a writer's tool by Mike to maybe tease some disaster that the audience obviously knows is coming before even starting the show because that's the format of the show is something fucked up and crazy happens every season. I think people that are obsessed with disasters are generally people who are really lost. Because the whole thing What I love about these tsunami videos, at least for Loughlin, is that it highlights the meaninglessness of life. The whole thing is like, wow, in a second, I can't remember how many, I think it was like, 270,000 people died in that tsunami. It's completely traumatized the country, and there's still remnants of it today. That just highlights the fact that it can all go away in a second. I think for someone like Loughlin, that needs to be the that life is meaningless because life is hard for him, emotionally, at least.

Everyone in the family is aware that it could go away any second in very different ways.

Exactly. That also plays into the whole thing of like, Timothy losing his money, and it's on different scales for everyone, whether it's like your whole city could actually be destroyed by a tsunami, or if it's like this way of life that you're so used to could go away in a second. What are our values, basically? And that's the big question with our whole family, I think, is do we value our way of life or do we value just life and the people around us? Or each other. Each other, yeah.

Sam, thank you so much for talking to us.

Yeah, thanks for coming in.

Yeah, well, this was so fun. You guys are really cool. I had a great time. Thank you.

Thanks to our guests, Tame and Lisa and Sam, and we'll see you all next week.

The White Lotus podcast is a production of HBO and Campside Media.

This episode was hosted by Gia Tolentino and Josh Beermann. Natalia Winckelman is the managing producer. Our associate producers are Allison Haynie, Anthony Pucillo, and Elia Papes. Sound design and mix by Ewen Laitzmuyun. At Campside Media, our executive producer is Josh Dean. For the HBO podcast team, our executive producer is Michael Gluckstadt, senior producer Allison Cohen-Zerokash, and producer Kenya Reyes. Thanks for listening, and we'll see you next time..