The Unprecedented Public Auditioning for 'The White Lotus' Season 3
A million girls would kill for that White Lotus job.
Stars: they’re just like us in that they, too, want to be a part of the White Lotus universe — and aren’t afraid to make that want explicitly known. Some are asked about it, while others simply throw their name in the ring, all in an attempt to woo a runner-up on Season 37 of Survivor, Mike White, who also happens to be one of the most powerful figures in Hollywood at the moment. And who can blame them? Booking work is hard enough, and this here is a job that will not only put you up at a five-star luxury resort for half the year, but will all but guarantee you a career breakthrough or renaissance — and perhaps even a statuette.
Since The White Lotus aired its second season finale in December, we, the gluttonous fandom, have been roaming in search of any bits to scarf down. We’ve gotten a few morsels: “We did Europe, and maybe Asia… that would be fun,” Mike White told Deadline at the Season 2 premiere in October. By the season’s conclusion in December, he confirmed that they were going to actively scout locations in Asia. “My instinct is that maybe it has something to do with spirituality,” he explained to Vanity Fair. “Eastern versus Western religion or Western people in an Eastern culture. Maybe after sex it would be nice to have something that’s a little more celestial or something that’s a little more out of the carnal.” The Thailand-set season was officially confirmed in late March, thus kiboshing some of the Internet’s valiant suggestions, which included: Bridgeport, Connecticut; The Dragonfly Inn; the Maldives; and Great Wolf Lodge.
Outside of a location, we’ve got basically no intel. However, our collective pleas for a character from the first two seasons to check back in were answered with the announcement that our favorite Season 1 wellness guru, Belinda (played by the great Natasha Rothwell), will make her return. Might her wellness expertise come into play in the aforementioned look at spirituality? Did she use Tanya’s parting envelope of cash to develop a magic mushrooms retreat add-on for guests of The White Lotus’ Thailand branch? The Internet (including me) is dying to find out.
Rothwell seems to have beat out some former cast members who had been weighing in online about the possibility of a re-up. In July 2022, Connie Britton revealed that Mike White wanted her back for Season 2. "There was an idea that I loved for the character," Britton told Deadline. "Our intention is to do it in the third season. A piece of casting didn't work in the second season and we're hoping to [do] that in the third season." Britton circled back to this in January stating, “Of course I would [return].” Her fellow Season 1 alums, Alexandra Daddario and Jake Lacy, spoke to Deadline about the possibility of them, too, returning for a future season — an idea courtesy of White himself. “Mike texted Alex and I with this idea for an episode where the two of us are talking for a half hour,” Lacy recounted. “It’s just the banality of rich people on a boat.”
“Well, we can always go back in time or come back as a ghost,” Emmy Award-winning Season 1 star Murray Bartlett offered, perhaps alluding to his character Armond or even Coolidge’s Tanya. (Look, I’d love to see Coolidge as Young Tanya à la Young Sheldon, employing whatever technology they transformed Brad Pitt with in Benjamin Button or whichever filter Ramona Singer uses on Instagram.)
That’s just the returning players. There’s also a sea of actors who have been asked or have freely offered themselves up as potential stars of one of the most critically acclaimed and buzziest series of the 2020s. The most hotly debated among them was Cake star Jennifer Aniston, who was doing a round of press for Murder Mystery 2 when an interviewer suggested that she play Tanya’s younger sister who is out to avenge her death. (Are we ignoring the fact that Tanya McQuoid is an only child? It seems yes!) “Did you hear it Mike White? I want Jennifer Coolidge. I love her," Aniston proclaimed. Her “obsessed with it” comment alone, spurred entirely by a savvy interviewer, spawned an entire news cycle. When PopBase (a Twitter account the likes of which we should do a deep dive on down the line) tweeted the news with some spin, writing, “Jennifer Aniston reveals she’s open to playing Jennifer Coolidge’s sister in ‘The White Lotus’ to avenge her death,” Twitter did the thing it does best and put a lid on what was never an aspiration, but rather a suggestion. The ensuing tweets are a sea of responses with the sentiment mostly akin to the Demi Lovato classic: “Get a job/stay away from her.”
Hayden Panettiere was similarly bated when asked which existing series she would love to join the cast of during an interview with E! News. "I want to do it so bad… I want to do it, like Tom Cruise-jumping-on-Oprah's-couch bad." In a moment that’s not meant to be funny and is therefore hilarious, the interview’s co-host offers Panettiere up to play “Jennifer Coolidge’s younger, younger, younger sister.”
And wouldn’t you know, two other examples were also instigated by E! News. “Is there any chance that you could fit a White Lotus Season 3 into your schedule?” an E! correspondent inquired of Emmy Award-winner Sheryl Lee Ralph on a recent red carpet. Ralph’s response: “Oh honey, please, call me.” James Marsden was similarly questioned and gave what is now a familiar refrain: "That is one of my favorite shows. That's one that I've been following very closely. Yeah, I'm in for that.”
And speaking of actresses in contention to play Tanya’s sister (a character that does not currently exist): Pamela Anderson. Despite never having seen the series (“I can't get it in Canada because my HBO app doesn't work because my Apple ID is American”) and calling it “White Onion”, Anderson declared she’s “up for anything” White Lotus-related during an appearance on the shoddily lit set of The Drew Barrymore Show. Later in the interview, at the prodding for Barrymore to return to acting, Anderson suggested that the pair should play sisters on the series. (While I don’t necessarily need that storyline on TWL, I am still very down for this.)
Would Bette Midler like to appear on the show? “Oh, please! Of course. In a New York minute.” What about Sarah Michelle Gellar? “I think that me, and everybody else, would love to be killed at The White Lotus.” And Johnny Knoxville? *very Roxie in Chicago voice* “Are you kidding?” Jamie Lee Curtis? She doesn’t know what it is, but she will do it!
And this is just the batch of celebs who have been asked!