Looking out over a sleepy bay from my hillside villa at Layan Life on the north coast of Phuket, I’m feeling just like Jennifer Coolidge. Or perhaps more accurately like Jennifer Coolidges’s White Lotus character, the wildly wealthy and hopelessly clueless Tanya McQuoid (RIP).
My skin still carries a light sheen of coconut oil from my morning massage, my muscles gently ache from the posture realignment in the afternoon and my stomach feels pleasantly – but not overly – full from the carefully curated meal just prepared by my private chef, taking into account my specific dietary requirements.
I had come to Thailand as part of a mission to uncover what we can expect from the new season of the hit HBO series – and it all seemed to be going rather well.
By the time I reached Phuket after a spin through Koh Samui, it had very much been a non-stop array of extravagant meals, golden beaches, sprawling villas and impeccable service. So far, so White Lotus. Fueled by a desire to see this part of southeast Asia before the White Lotus crowds descend and make the islands even busier, along with a borderline obsession with the first two seasons, the plan was to snoop my way around the hotels where the show was filmed and dig out some clues as to what will make season three different – while getting a taste of holidaying like the one per cent.
The fact that a Four Seasons hotel would feature had seemed like a no-brainer to me (both the first two seasons were filmed in these swanky resorts in Hawaii and Sicily), so with my limited time in Thailand I was going to focus on the Anantara hotels. Rumours had been swirling around for weeks that they would play a central role, based largely on the fact that the properties appeared fully booked up and unavailable to holidaymakers in April and May during the off-peak travel season – and what appears to have been White Lotus filming season.
Mine (and the internet’s) suspicions were confirmed when I touched down at the sprawling beachfront Anantara Bophut Koh Samui. Locals were talking about being recruited as extras during filming and, despite all involved being sworn to secrecy, it was fairly common knowledge that the hotels I had booked into both here and in Phuket were indeed the ones the White Lotus guests had laid their heads down at too.
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Right out of the gate, it seemed obvious that wellness was going to be an overarching theme for season three. Belinda Rothwell (played by Natasha Rothwell), is the only returning character from either of the prior seasons and she played the spa manager at White Lotus Maui in Hawaii – although interestingly in season three she returns as a guest on an exchange programme to learn more about the wellness treatments on offer in Thailand.
The spa at Anantara Bophut appears to be made for The White Lotus – especially at night when you walk across candle-lit walkways over rippling lotus ponds to the individual garden treatment rooms. Behind towering wooden doors you’ll find rain showers, sunken tubs filled with frangipani and hand-carved stones and crystals. It’s luxurious, mystical and wonderfully relaxing – with a hint of mystery.
For dinner I left Bophut to get a taste of what was on offer at Anantara Lawana on the other side of the island. You can spot the gorgeous villas of this hotel in the trailer, nestled in the treetops gazing down on the idyllic shoreline. Here I experienced a menu fit for White Lotus royalty: eight exquisite courses including red cabbage tapioca chips with tarragon duxelles and artichoke; rock lobster saffron seafood soup; and braised chicken breast with citrus, pistachio crumble, thyme jus, and honey-roasted beetroots.
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While I’m in Koh Samui the beach is quiet and serene with only a few tourists dotted along the shore on sunbeds or taking a dip in the warm waters. But locals have mentioned being used as extras at parties on the beach. And this being The White Lotus, we can expect a heady dose of depravity and hedonism. So I’ve no doubt that Thailand’s famous full moon parties will feature in some capacity.
This sits rather interestingly alongside the idea of eastern religion and spirituality that series creator Mike White had previously suggested would feature in White Lotus Thailand. At the end of season two in 2022, he said: “The first season kind of highlighted money, and then the second season is sex.
“I think the third season would be maybe a satirical and funny look at death and eastern religion and spirituality. It feels like it could be a rich tapestry to do another round at White Lotus.”
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But then I guess this has for many years been the contrast in Thailand. This is a country with spirituality running through its veins, where you’ll encounter peaceful temples, holy shines, and lucky charms, and there is a strong sense of living in harmony with spirits and the natural world. Although tourists come to soak in this spirituality, they also often come to dance under the full moon, indulge in a few Sabai cocktails and prop up at a beach bar into the early hours.
My next prediction is monkeys. There are plenty of real ones in the countryside around the island, and wooden carvings of the three wise monkeys (depicting the philosophy of see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil) are scattered around Anantara Bophut. I felt (and still do) like they must feature prominently in season three – much like the Sicilian ceramic heads, known as teste di moro, are an important symbol in season two.
But then checking into Anantara Mai Khao in Phuket the first thing I noticed was turtles everywhere – gold ones on the bathroom taps, a ceramic one spraying water into my private villa pool, a little stone one peeking out from behind plants at the restaurant. This momentarily threw me from my initial assumption that monkeys will be a central motif (maybe turtles?) – until I rewatch the trailer and it fades out with a praying monkey.
At Mai Khao I found sweeping golden sands, hideaway villas and lush greenery creating a jungle of privacy. It wasn’t hard to imagine a guest of the White Lotus sipping cocktails in their al fresco bathtub, making requests of their private butler or strolling to the spa of a lagoon of blooming lotuses.
But it’s at Layan Life where I feel that I’ve really stepped into White Lotus land. It’s a world of carefully curated luxury and wellness, where golf buggies whip you from villa to treatments to upscale restaurants where you can gaze at Phuket’s startling beautiful night sky after a dinner of the finest Asian cuisine. The wellness offering here is unlike any I’ve ever experienced – this is no ordinary spa. The sprawling Layan Life with shimmering glass walls offers everything from Traditional Thai medicine and IV vitamin therapy to Himalayan hot saunas. There’s a hyperbaric oxygen room, a cryotherapy icepod chamber, an aqua vitality suite and a colonic hydrotherapy area. If The White Lotus is going down the wellness route, it may well have struck gold here.
White Lotus snooping aside, Anantara hotels are absolutely gorgeous, the staff charming with a great sense of humour (they accepted my grilling for information with grace and good nature) and their wellness offerings are beautifully delivered. Southern Thailand itself feels like paradise – it’s no wonder the elite would choose to holiday here.
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But something sat slightly uneasy with me as I took a sunrise run on the beach in Phuket one morning. At first glance these sands are heartachingly gorgeous; picture-book perfect. But as I jogged along the shoreline, and the beauty of Anantara and other big name hotels receded, giving way to smaller local resorts and restaurants, the vibe changed slightly. The beach, which had clearly been painstakingly cleaned by staff even before I woke up that morning outside my hotel, was now littered with bits of plastic, broken flip flops, bottles of discarded liquor, and old fishermen’s ropes. A dark sludge was oozing into a pool set back from the beach, and the skeletons of hotels, abandoned and partly burnt out, came into view. A couple of friendly stray dogs trotted along with me wagging their tails before disappearing into the trees along the shore. It was a small taste of Phuket beyond the tourist-friendly glamour. Not dangerous or sinister, but undeniably real.
And maybe that is why this part of the island had been chosen by HBO. Because ultimately, isn’t this really what’s at the heart of The White Lotus? The underside to these beautiful locations. The yawning gap between the haves and the have-nots, and the almost comical obliviousness of the elite to the stark realities around them. After all, the beautiful lotus flower grows even in dark places. Beyond the gorgeous villas, the heavenly massages, the exquisite tasting menus and carefully curated cocktails – and beyond the monkeys and the turtles – there’s a gritty reality that is rumbling under the surface. And we’ll no doubt see a taste of that in season three.
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