If there’s one thing we’ve learned from two seasons of the HBO smash hit The White Lotus, it’s that luxury resorts are intense, frenetic, and constantly surprising places to work. And general managers have it the hardest. In season one, set at the fictional White Lotus in Hawaii, head honcho Armond (Murray Bartlett) enters a feud with a manchild guest so ruthless that one of them winds up in a body bag. Meanwhile, over in Sicily for season two, Valentina (Sabrina Impacciatore) contends with guests who can’t drive demanding Vespas and sex workers propping up the hotel bar. We don’t yet know what’s in store for Fabian (Christian Friedel) in the show’s forthcoming third season, but it’s certain to involve more moneyed visitors, high tension, and death.
There is one man who knows the chaos of running a real-life luxury resort very well. And that’s Jasjit Assi, the general manager of the Four Seasons in Koh Samui, Thailand, where The White Lotus season three was filmed. He has 60 villas, 15 private residences and 300 staff to keep in order – plus jet-setter guests with wild requests, lofty expectations and even higher bank balances. “Customer interactions are not easy. They take [an] emotional and physical toll on you because you’re always here,” Assi says. “But you wouldn’t be in the service industry if you didn’t have the passion, resilience and persistence to continue.”
In what sounds like a scene plucked straight from the show, Assi greets guests upon their arrival – often by private jet or luxury yacht – at the hotel’s dramatic cliff top platform, overlooking 43 acres of tropical landscape and the turquoise Gulf of Thailand. The White Lotus creator, Mike White, had been scouting locations from north to south of the country, but after receiving the Koh Samui resort welcome, he knew he’d found what he was searching for. “He looks at this place, pauses, takes a breath and is staring at the view in front of him,” recalls Assi. “Then he goes to me, ‘This is it. It’s going to be fun, right?’”
The cast of the new season, including Jason Isaacs, Carrie Coon, Parker Posey, Leslie Bibb, Natasha Rothwell and Patrick Schwarzenegger, all stayed at the resort throughout filming, which costs around $1,500 (£1,200) a night for a regular villa and $15,000 (£12,000) for a five-bedroom residence. White visited several times ahead of the shoot to look out over the infinity pools and visualise season three’s storylines – not a bad day at the office. “My entire team signed a non-disclosure agreement,” reveals Assi. “People were like, ‘Mike White is sitting there’, and I had to say, ‘Sorry, I don’t know. He’s just a guest’.”
Assi has a long list of unconventional requests he’s received from guests over the years. “There was one guy who asked, ‘Can I bring eight dogs in your private jet to the resort?’ I said, ‘There is no doubt about it’,” the general manager recalls. Another time, one VIP, who was overcome with emotion by the full moon, suddenly wanted a ring to propose to his girlfriend at 11 o’clock at night – an hour after the island closes off from the outside world. “It couldn’t be just any ring,” points out Assi. “He wanted high-end jewellery. Different gemstones. So, our concierge had to use their contacts, calling people, collecting pieces; we didn’t even know what ring size she was. You’re always dealt these last-minute challenges. But this is the Four Seasons. We can fix it for you.” The man proposed by midnight.
Breakfast is ordinarily the most important part of Assi’s day, as it’s one of the only times he’s able to connect with guests before they splinter off to do different activities. “We call that the golden hour,” he says. Each morning, the GM will brief his team on the day’s plan of action: “You’re talking arrivals, departures, complaints from the previous day,” he says. “Making sure that everybody is on the same page – what is our shared vision together?”
Next, it’s “peak operations” from 10am to 2pm. This means room service, checking people in and out, facilitating recreational activities like yacht trips and Muay Thai boxing lessons, and monitoring the full spa. Two o’clock onwards is for “connections”: lunch, schmoozing at the beach, checking if there’s any issues to rectify. Come evening, it’s time to “set the tone”: turn the lights down, open the wine cellar, make cocktails and prepare for any special events – musical performances, private dinners, proposals – that are happening at the resort. After the partying is done, the team packs away and prepares to do it all over again. That is, unless there’s an incident.
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The White Lotus resorts of the drama have seen everything from heavy drug use and forbidden romances to murder. Assi says that, at Koh Samui, he’ll ask guests to leave public spaces if he sees them doing anything from weed to cocaine, and will send them to check out if their habit gets “out of control”. Romance between staff and guests is “100 per cent a no go”, and could lead to employees losing their jobs if boundaries are crossed.
Unlike on the show, no guests have been stabbed to death or drowned after jumping from a yacht at Koh Samui – but Assi is well versed in the hotel’s tragedy procedure. “Deaths are dealt with with the utmost seriousness,” he says.
“There’s a lot of legalities involved. Resort crisis management procedure comes into place. An immediate notification goes to the local police. You have to deal with it in complete silence so that other guests don’t know something has happened. There’s someone grieving and you are their only source of help because they’re in a foreign land and don’t know what to do next.”
Assi admits that, in many ways, The White Lotus is a faithful depiction of life as a general manager: “The resort surroundings, the attentive service, the ambience, the commitment to excellence – these things are very true,” he says. But he promises he’s never entered into an Armond-esque feud with an entitled guest in his time on the job. “Everybody’s on holiday and in a relaxed state. Nobody wants to get agitated unnecessarily,” the GM claims. Mike White, I’m sure, would disagree.
‘The White Lotus’ season three arrives on Sky Atlantic and Now on 16 February
