Season 3, Episode 2: ‘Special Treatments’
“The White Lotus” has always been a show that centers sensuality, and so far in Season 3, the creator, Mike White, has amplified that dreamy, loopy, intoxicated feeling. In this week’s episode, in a sequence set during the resort’s dinner service, the guests — and we, the viewers — are blitzed with distractions. There are musicians, dancers and acrobats serving as mealtime entertainment, and bursts of flame rising from the table-side food prep. The characters, meanwhile, are still jet-lagged and coping with culture shock — not to mention a little tipsy. (Hey, it’s vacation.)
Everything is so overwhelming, surreal that even a sudden outburst of violence feels like a dream.
There are no answers this week — or even hints — to the identity of the dead body we saw in the season premiere or the circumstances that will lead to gunshots at this White Lotus. But we do see a robbery. While Chelsea is browsing in the resort’s luxury goods shop, a gun-toting masked marauder executes a smash-and-grab, terrorizing the staff and guests. Who is this criminal? That is another mystery left unsolved for now. It’s just another tease from White that the vibes here in Thailand are off.
We do however get more clarity on what’s going with our guests. The Ratliffs mostly spend their first full day at the White Lotus lounging around, getting massages — and, in Saxon’s case, complaining his massage didn’t include a “happy ending.” The only Ratliff who does not pamper himself is the patriarch, Tim. (When their health mentor, Pam, tells him that she didn’t book anything for him, he enthusiastically replies, “You’re killin’ it, Pam!”)
After the ominous phone call Tim received from The Wall Street Journal on the night the family arrived in Thailand, he hears in the morning that The Washington Post also wants to talk to him. Whatever shady money laundering scheme he is involved in — which he claims netted him a paltry “10 million” — is about to become international news.
The equally troubled Rick takes advantage of one of the spa’s amenities, letting his girlfriend Chelsea talk him into having a “stress-management” session with Dr. Amrita (Shalini Peiris), a meditation specialist. (We first met Amrita last week, in the opening flash-forward with Zion.) Rick shares with Amrita just a little about himself — but nothing about whatever dark mission has led him to Thailand. He tells her his mother was a drug addict and that his father was murdered before Rick was born. He says his stress level typically hovers around an 8 out of 10, unless he has weed. (He does not currently have weed.)
It’s hard to know how on-the-level Rick is being with Amrita. He has no reason to lie, but also no reason to be honest. What’s fascinating about the dynamic between these two is that while Amrita is offering what she believes to be some helpful philosophical musings — mainly by suggesting to him that his identity is an “illusion” that “brings you suffering” — he counters by saying that the world is actually very real.
“If nobody puts gas in the tank, the car won’t start,” he says. “Nothing comes from nothing, right?”
Meanwhile, the gal-pals spend their day taking biomarker tests and then quietly — and sometimes not-so-quietly — judging each other’s results. They boast about their off-the-charts hydration levels, and then are skeptical when too many of them were told they “have the numbers of someone half my age.” (Jaclyn and Kate also seem unduly surprised when Laurie says that her “fat mass” is under 25 percent.) They chat about the effort they all put into staying healthy, with Jaclyn describing it as “my job” as an actress married to a hunk half her age, and Kate insisting that to eat right in Austin she has tricked her mind into liking beans.
The true heart of the ladies’ story line this week lies in two scenes that bracket the episode. The first is set at the end of the night they arrived. After Laurie has gone to bed, Jaclyn and Kate take a minute to gush over how great Laurie is and how well she’s doing in New York, before transitioning smoothly — without much of a change in tone — to talking about Laurie’s tough divorce, her stalled career and her questionable decision to raise an emotionally troubled daughter in the big city. They end by saying that their “great friend” looks “defeated” … and is possibly a drunk.
One night later, it is Laurie and Kate’s turn to slice up Jaclyn when their friend is out of the room. They start off talking about how “amazing” and “funny” Jaclyn is, before Laurie clarifies that by “funny” she means competitive, narcissistic and vain. (“Did she sandblast her face or something?” Kate asks. “It’s more than just ‘the basics.’”) They insist Jaclyn is “still gorgeous,” while also questioning the health of her marriage. (“She says they’re addicted to each other, but are they ever even in the same city?”)
White has a gift for writing this kind of dialogue and for directing actors in these kinds of scenes, where everyone is smiling and friendly and yet also kind of horrible. In another of this episode’s standout moments, Kate strikes up a conversation with Victoria Ratliff, whom she remembers spending a whole weekend with at a baby shower for a mutual friend. Victoria maintains a pleasant enough demeanor during this whole interaction, but she refuses to acknowledge knowing Kate or attending that shower.
When her children later accuse her of being rude, Victoria is unmoved. She’s not impressed by Kate’s wealth or her Hollywood actress friend. (“Actresses are all basically prostitutes,” she declares. “If they’re lucky. Am I right?”)
Victoria is in her own tiny bubble. Dulled by anxiety meds and distrustful of anyone not named Ratliff, she warns her kids that the world is filled with “scammers” who “don’t have good values” — unlike her own brood, of course, whom she finds absolutely delightful, even when Saxon uses racist caricature to complain about not being serviced during his massage.
Again, White excels at capturing the woozy world of self-regard in which Victoria dwells — and in which, really, all of the Ratliffs dwell. Even Lochlan and Piper, who think of themselves as more enlightened than their loutish brother and materialistic parents, have a lot of Victoria in them.
There is a beautifully shot and deeply uneasy scene in this episode in which Lochlan and Piper sprawl out in hammocks that have been strung just above the Gulf of Thailand waterline, where they talk about Saxon’s piggishness and what Piper gets out of Buddhism studies. White puts us down at the kids’ level, wanting us to understand the sensations they must be feeling, with the warm sun and seas, the lapping waves, and the swaying ropes supporting their scantily clad bodies.
But just as important as what they feel is what they think. When Lochlan tells Piper he tried to pray during a session in a sensory deprivation tank, he admits the experience did nothing for him. There were no spiritual revelations. No comforting divine presence. He was alone with who he is. Nothing more. As Lochlan puts it, starkly: “I felt like I was just talking to myself.”
Concierge Service
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Chelsea convinces a typically reluctant Rick to have dinner with her new friend Chloe and Chloe’s husband, “Gary.” I put that name in quotation marks because faithful “White Lotus” viewers will know Gary as Greg, the series’s recurring villain. You know who else recognizes Gary as Greg? Belinda, who spots him across the dining room and gets a stricken look on her face.
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Speaking of Belinda, she begins her knowledge-sharing program with Pornchai (Dom Hetrakul), with each treating the other to their respective signature spa treatments. He gives her a warrior massage, then she gives him a much gentler rubdown. (“You won’t be screaming out in agony,” she says. “But people seem to like it.”) There is a hint that this relationship might become something more than professional when Belinda invites Pornchai to get on her massage table, asking him to lay “on my stomach” before chuckling and correcting it to “your stomach.”
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There are two notable White Lotus employees I failed to mention last week. One is Sritala Hollinger (Patravadi Mejudhon), the co-owner of this resort with her currently absent husband Jim, and a local celebrity because of her past as an actress and musician. The other employee to keep an eye on is Sritala’s fussy general manager Fabian (Christian Friedel), an amateur songwriter clearly envious of his boss’s showbiz flair. When asked if he would ever perform one of his songs for the guests, he mutters, “Maybe one day.” Until then, as always, his identity remains a prison.
