Alexandra Daddario's Honeymoon Turns into Horror in 'The White Lotus'
Actress Alexandra Daddario speaks with L'OFFICIEL about starring in HBO's 'The White Lotus,' a new satirical limited series that follows the less than perfect stays of the titular resort's guests.
What happens when you realize that the person you married is a spoiled man-child who can’t fathom not getting exactly what he wants? And what if that revelation comes too soon after the I do’s, on your honeymoon in paradise, in fact? Rachel Patton, a kind, flailing journalist played by Alexandra Daddario, faces this dilemma as she spends a tropical-getaway-turned-nightmare at a Hawaiian resort with her husband Shane (Jake Lacy) in the new HBO show The White Lotus.
The six-episode limited series written and directed by Mike White (Enlightened, School of Rock) follows Rachel, Shane, and two other VIP guest parties (made up of a stellar cast featuring Jennifer Coolidge, Connie Britton, Steve Zahn, Sydney Sweeney, Fred Hechinger, and Brittany O'Grady) staying at the luxurious White Lotus resort, as well as a few members of the hotel’s staff (played by Murray Bartlett, Natasha Rothwell, and Jolene Purdy) over the course of a week. From the get go, the audience knows there are more sinister forces at play—the first episode opens at the conclusion of the guests’ stays, with Shane telling a couple at the airport that someone died at the White Lotus.
But the specter of death that looms over the series falls second to the depth of the guests’ privilege that sees them go to great lengths to get what they want, without consideration for the hotel staff that must serve their whims. This dynamic is particularly apparent as Shane spends his honeymoon chasing after hotel manager Armond to get an upgraded room. At the same time, he exposes his rich-kid mentality to Rachel, who doesn’t come from the same world of wealth as her new husband and wonders if the two are that compatible after all. As Daddario puts it, the show follows “the idea that these are all people with their own problems, and their problems are more important than anything else. They're not paying attention to what's going on right around them.”
The sharp satire unfolds beautifully in Hawaii, filmed on location at The Four Seasons during the pandemic, where the cast and crew “had full Lord of the Flies run of the place for the first month,” according to Daddario. It’s not lost on the actress, known for her work in Baywatch and the Percy Jackson films, how the constructed privilege in the show was shadowed by the very real privilege of working and filming at a Hawaiian resort during a global pandemic. “It was hard and you didn't want to feel like it was hard, because you're in this beautiful place and you're also dealing with this show about privilege and you feel privileged, but you're also struggling and I think we reached a point where both can exist at the same time.”
Here, Daddario tells L’OFFICIEL more about working on The White Lotus, how she got into character, and what kept her sane during the pandemic.
L’OFFICIEL: What drew you to The White Lotus as your next project?
Alexandra Daddario: Well, there were several things. The first main thing was that it was Mike White's show and I'm a huge fan of his. I just love his perspective of the world, this sort of dark comedic sensibility. I think he's a brilliant director and writer. But also it was the end of last year—deep pandemic time—and I didn't expect to work at all. I certainly didn't expect to work in Hawaii at the Four Seasons, that was like the most perfect thing ever. It was more challenging than I'm describing it just because of the quarantine and because you're shooting during a pandemic, but I felt very lucky to even have the chance to work with Mike.
L’O: How did you feel about the satirical, darker edge to the show?
AD: As we've all discovered over the last 18 months, life can be very dark and tragic, but I also believe that the way we get through those things is through humor. Also, [the show] is touching on privilege and how people ignore the world around them and ignore reality and think their problems are the most important. The show has a very funny way of addressing that kind of privilege.
L’O: Privilege definitely comes to mind, especially with your character's storyline. How did you work out that dynamic for Rachel specifically?
AD: For my character, and how I approach all of my characters, my problems are the most important problems. My character believes in her issues just like we all do—it's all relative—we all have our things that we're struggling with in life and I understand what my character's struggling with. She is struggling with what it is to be a woman in her 30s, what it is to get married and not have a career, and be marrying a man with all this money, and does that mean that I failed somehow at doing my own thing? Am I a proper feminist and have I lived the life that I was expecting to live? And I haven't made peace with who I am and do I even know who I am and all of that. I completely understand where [the character] is coming from but with a lot of the characters in this show and the people who deal with them, there's this idea that your problems are the most important problems and a lack of perspective.
L’O: What was the conversation you and the director had in shaping Rachel?
AD: I trusted Mike and I know that he liked my audition and the approach to it, so that always starts out well. Especially auditioning—sometimes you don't audition, you get straight-offered something and you're coming in and you're like, “Oh god am I approaching this the right way? They offered me the job, they think I'm right for this, but they haven't seen me do the scenes yet." So sometimes it's more comforting when you've auditioned that you know your approach to the character was what they were looking for. So we came in and I basically built off of that, what I had done in the audition, and we discussed a lot how she got herself into the situation, or maybe I dealt with that more on my own. How does a person arrive on their honeymoon and think “Oh god I made a terrible mistake"? I know this has happened in real life where you get caught up in the fun of a wedding and "I'm the right age to get married and my husband's handsome and the sex is good and he has money and we're having so much fun," and you don't have the hard conversations about what a marriage really is and what you intend on doing with your lives after that point. So I thought a lot about that because, How did I get myself to this place? was really a big question I had.
L’O: What was it like having Jake Lacy as your partner throughout all of this?
AD: Oh, he is wonderful! Really the whole cast—and I know everyone says that, it's boring—but it's very true. Jake's a great guy and always was prepared and always had a perspective and in addition—and this is true of the entire cast but especially Jake, because I spent so much time with him—you're quarantined, being tested regularly, and you have to stay away from other people and life happens while you're working and you need to have someone to talk to but you can't go see your friends, you can't leave the property, so I was really grateful to have someone to chat with about all kinds of things. Someone to have real conversations with so that you're not always alone in your room, and everyone was really great about that. We all needed connection during a time when we had already been quarantined and then you go and you're further quarantined, so everyone was willing to connect and support each other.
L’O: You mentioned you were quarantined, but did you get to do anything fun while you were in Hawaii?
AD: On the Four Seasons property, there's this little area that you can snorkel in with gigantic turtles. It's so cool, and I would go snorkeling almost every morning and that would be my peaceful moment where you're safe and you can just commune with nature. These turtles just stare at you, you have to keep a good distance from them, and they're so beautiful. I went between the beach and my room and work, so that was all great, but for two and a half months that was basically my routine. It's wonderful, but also very strange. You can be very frustrated and feel very isolated and also be very grateful that you're in this beautiful place and that's how I started to feel.
L’O: Were there any hobbies you picked up that helped you stay sane?
AD: I started a YouTube channel early on in the pandemic, which sounds ridiculous, but I found I would just put the camera on and record myself and the two girls I was quarantining with. I continued that through Hawaii and even till now, although now it's changed. I filmed myself with the turtles, and I found it very, very relaxing and meditative to just edit and have something creative to do. I have this weird documentary of the last year and a half of my life in this YouTube channel, so that was something that we did creatively to keep us sane. I ordered a huge colored pencil set and I would just draw weird stick figures doing things, like a weird stick figure diary of my day sometimes. And I did a lot of reading; I became obsessed with the Fitzgeralds and I started reading everything about F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, and I would write a lot. That all helped, and honestly, having work really helped, I was very lucky to be able to travel and work during that period of time.
L’O: Do you have a personal favorite vacation memory?
AD: I’ve been very lucky, especially because of my career, to travel to so many beautiful places, and then sometimes like piggyback vacations off of my job or that kind of thing. I'm big into adventures, like going to Pompeii. It’s so cool, just the concept of this whole city that's partially still standing, thinking about how long ago it was and how the government ran and how these people lived, and it really gives you perspective on your own life. I just find it fascinating to stand in a structure that old, in a city that old, and there's really not a feeling like it. I'm very into stories and people and how people lived and why we are the way that we are and the nature of love and the nature of loss and all of that. I think that you can find all of that in stories and in history and that really fascinates me.
