Jason Isaacs Talks ‘The White Lotus’ Season 3 at the Chateau Marmont

Cormac Newman February 24, 2025

Before he signed on to star as Timothy Ratliff in the third season of The White Lotus, Jason Isaacs hadn’t seen a single episode. In his defence, however, this wasn’t entirely his fault. Isaacs was plenty intrigued by the show’s six-episode debut season, he explains, but he’d missed the pilot. “I knew it was this incredibly popular and successful show: my wife and daughters had watched it and just raved about it,” Isaacs says, adding with a laugh: “I tried to go in the room and watch season one, and they went, ‘No, no, Dad, you can’t come in! You’ve got to start from the beginning.'”

A year later, Isaacs tried, again, to join his family by the television (this time, for the show’s second season), but he struck out once more. “I went to sit down and watch with them, and they went ‘No, no Dad, you’ve got to watch season one first!’ So, I was banned from watching it and I felt like, ‘Oh, I’ve got two seasons of this clearly magnificent show to catch up on,’ but I never did,” explains the actor.

While he might have been banned from watching the show, Isaacs’ family said nothing about an audition. So, when he got the call, Isaacs jumped at the chance. He hadn’t auditioned in decades, but he found the process to be “an odd and rather lovely” experience: “I felt like I was 25 again; I was stuttering and flustered in the room.” Flustered or not, it worked. Shortly after, Isaacs met with the showrunner himself.

“I got to speak to Mike [White] — because the audition, clearly, wasn’t too catastrophic — and I lied,” he admits. “I told him and the producer, Dave, how [White Lotus] was my favourite show, how brilliant it was, and all the reasons it was so brilliant, and I hadn’t seen it.” It’s a classic thespian tactic, he says. “You’re asked if you can horse ride, do origami, sword fight — whatever it is, you always say yes.” If loving White Lotus was riding a horse, Isaacs could’ve taken a blue ribbon home from his first derby. That’s to say, he was hooked. “Only after I think I got the job do I sit down and binge season one and season two, and realize that what I was saying was true: it was every bit as good as I’d been praising it,” he says. “The acting all seemed utterly truthful to me. I bought everybody.”

Elated as he was to share his family’s cinematic obsession, Isaacs’ newfound love for the series brought a different hurdle. As the actor closed in on the season finale, he felt a mounting tension of his own. “I just thought, ‘Oh, fuck: the bar’s really high!” Isaacs says. Already a fan of the writer, Isaacs had followed Mike White’s work since 2000’s Chuck and Buck, and was a loyal viewer of White’s 2011 series Enlightened, a two-season collaboration between Mike White and Laura Dern. Still, The White Lotus managed to raise the bar.

“I was utterly transported and I thought [White] spun all those plates simultaneously: entertainment and dramatics — kind of a thriller, action version of it — and the anthropological excavation of the human condition that he does so brilliantly,” Isaacs says of the first two seasons. “While I was enjoying all those things, and his remarkable skill as a storyteller, I was just constantly thinking, ‘Fuck. I’ve got to make sure that I’m this honest.’”

A healthy dose of intimidation is justified. With just two seasons, The White Lotus has already snagged a staggering fifteen Primetime Emmy Awards. Stars from previous iterations include Theo James, Sydney Sweeney, Jake Lacy, and — of course — fan-favourite Jennifer Coolidge, who featured in both instalments. “Mike throws a bunch of people into a pressure cooker, many of whom need to find out who they are and what they’re doing in life; whether they’re doing anything right or wrong and whether all the things that they were are gonna sustain them,” Isaacs says. “Then, he closes the walls in on them.”

“I’ve got some difficult and very dramatic scenes to pull off. That’s the kind of thing actors both enjoy and that keeps us awake at night.”

Jason Isaacs

Each miniseries follows an ensemble cast during their stay at The White Lotus, a fictional hotel chain. Luxe locales (swanky Hawaiian beaches, Italian seaports, and most recently, the tropics of Thailand), stand in stark contrast to tense interpersonal conflicts between guests; previous seasons have explored everything from family structures and generational divides to class politics, infidelity, and drug use. Each season begins with a bodybag, though the deadly details are shrouded in secret until the finale. From one viewer to another: the show will keep you on your toes.

“It all seemed so perfectly done,” Isaacs agrees “I knew — not to give too much away to the readers — that I’ve got this massive emotional arc in this. I’ve got some very big scenes coming up, big in the sense of a kind of Shakespearean, Greek tragedy style.” At first blush, the script evoked excitement and fear in equal measure. As his flight to Thailand inched closer, Isaacs’ anticipation only mounted: “There was this rumble, this low rumble of enjoyable, inspiring terror rising in me, like, that I’m going to have to pull something out of the bag. I’ve got some difficult and very dramatic scenes to pull off. That’s the kind of thing actors both enjoy and that keeps us awake at night.”

As preparation, he plunged into his character, Tim Ratliff — a finance tycoon taking a reluctant week off from his work in North Carolina — at full throttle. “This is a very fucked up family, I have a very fucked up holiday. More happens to them in a week than happens for most people in a lifetime,” Isaacs laughs. “That’s why we tune in.” Tim travels with his… relaxed wife, Victoria (brought to life by indie legend Parker Posey) and their three children: Saxon, Piper, and Lochlan (Patrick Schwarzenegger, Sarah Catherine Hook, and Sam Nivola).

When I ask about working with Posey, Isaacs says the script kept her at arm’s length. “We didn’t do that much together, mostly because — even when we were together on set — her character is out of her head on drugs; on antidepressants, sedatives, and stuff. Then, eventually, at some point, things happen to me that make me not present either,” he explains. “So, our characters, husband and wife, are no longer connected by the time they arrive there. [Tim Ratliff’s] wife is essentially a drugged out zombie, and he feels like he’s got to take care of the kids.”

That’s not unique to Mrs. Ratliff, though. Tim embodies a certain ‘go it alone’ masculinity: he shoulders every possible burden for his family. Although, as Isaacs explains his character, this seems to come from concern over his reputation rather than the goodness of his heart.

“Tim is one of the ruling elite and is coasting on this power. Never for a minute has it occurred to him that he might lose everything — until he arrives at The White Lotus.”

Jason Isaacs on his character in ‘The White Lotus’

“This is a man who thinks he’s got to take care of the whole world,” Isaacs elaborates. “He’s what Tom Wolfe used to call a big swinging dick of Wall Street — he’s the big swinging dick of Durham, North Carolina. He’s a fat cat of industry, but there’s generational wealth and status, and all of that is threatened. He rightly sees himself as the patriarch of both his community, but particularly of his children. He’s an old fashioned southern titan, and when everything begins to be threatened — their money, their futures — are all entirely bound up in his status, his wealth, and his power.”

Even if Tim was in “his own terrified bubble,” Isaacs formed genuine friendships off-screen. He says he got particularly close with Schwarzenegger, Hook, and Nivola (“my kids!”) recounting everything from card games and shared meals to television and boat rides.

On that subject — as some attentive fans have mentioned, Tim’s children bear a striking resemblance to an old proverb: “See no evil, hear no evil, and speak no evil.” Schwarzenegger’s delightfully-dense Saxon is, in Isaacs’ words, “trying to ape what he thinks a man is by looking at his father,” while ignoring the any sign of trouble beneath the surface. Headphone-wearing Piper, in contrast, is “trying to be anything but” Mr. and Mrs. Ratliff. Meanwhile, Lochlan — the youngest — is a pathological people pleaser: he sees and hears evil, but he’ll speak none.

As a viewer, dysfunctional dynamics are on full display from the get go. Yet for the Ratliffs (who, naturally, have a tendency to sweep things under the rug), only the close quarters of a family vacation allows these fractures to come to light. “[Saxon] is compensating for his lack of actual power because he gets his vicarious power through his dad. [He’s compensating] with sexual conquests, and with this pursuit of ‘alpha male perfection’ in his body and in his work,” Isaacs adds. “I think it breaks Tim’s heart a little to look at his son and see that there’s nothing there. Then, he looks at his other children who are reacting the opposite way.”

Tim is perceptive, to be sure, though Isaacs notes that he’s a tad preoccupied with his own troubles. Money and status are everything to Mr. Ratliff; they compose his identity and dictate his decisions. Much of his story, then, has to do with maintaining his reputation and status when these things are threatened. “I don’t think he can imagine who he might be without any of those things. So, there are various different things that will be coming up — that I shouldn’t talk about in too much granular detail — that are the ways he tries to cope with that,” Isaacs explains. Later, he adds: “My character is absolutely trying to escape his own thoughts for a large chunk of this. But beyond that, I’m not sure we should give too much away…” Fair enough!

“There’s an offscreen White Lotus as much as an onscreen White Lotus — just with slightly fewer body bags — to navigate and to add to the intensity of the whole experience.”

Jason Isaacs

Instead of discussing specifics, we turn to an archetype: the twisted patriarch. It’s a familiar role for Isaacs, whose resume includes roles like Peter Pan‘s Captain Hook and Harry Potter’s Lucius Malfoy. Though Tim Ratliff is “wildly different” from the latter, Isaacs notes that he shares some traits with JK Rowling’s Death Eater. “They both have relied on, or enjoyed at least, tremendous privilege and status. Their reputation almost defines them. They both do have that challenged.”

The two men differ, however, when it comes to acceptance. The public nature of Malfoy’s unraveling forces him to reckon with his status-driven worldview, whereas Tim enjoys the luxury of denial. “In Harry Potter, Voldemort sees right through Malfoy, he thinks he hasn’t been loyal or faithful and he is too obsessed with his own status. He snaps my wand at the table in Malfoy manor, which is a tremendously emasculating thing to do. It always felt like castration to me,” Isaacs explains. “For Tim, he’s not questioned the fact that he will always be powerful. Malfoy, on the other hand, is on his back foot, realizing that the Death Eaters had lost, but Tim is one of the ruling elite and is coasting on this power. Never for a minute has it occurred to him that he might lose everything — until he arrives at The White Lotus.”

These questions are the core of the third season. In the almost three-year buildup to the first episode, Mike White said he was inspired to write “a satirical and funny look at death and Eastern religion and spirituality.” Accordingly, there’s an extra layer of existentialism. We watch as characters identify, examine, and re-examine themselves through the lens of materialism and spirituality. Relationships, too, are front and centre.

“A good friend of mine said that if you want to feel self-esteem at night, do something esteemable during the day. It’s not something you think yourself into.”

Jason Isaacs

To investigate these profound subjects in a short, eight-episode story — and to balance dramatic intensity with White’s signature comedic wit — is a Herculean feat. Yet, as previous seasons can attest, The White Lotus pulls it off. Isaacs attributes its success to the strength of White’s pen, noting that he excels as a writer and director: “I knew what an extraordinary writer he was, but I didn’t know, as a director, how skilled he was at helping everyone give their best. He’s encouraging improvisation, but also throwing out his own ideas behind the camera.” The characters feel human, he adds, which lends a realist quality to the performance.

Despite emotional intensity of the role, Isaacs remains grounded. Throughout his career, he’s refined the separation between acting and home life. “I’ve taken on the character or walked in other people’s shoes for nearly 40 years,” he tells me. “Sometimes they’re heartbroken, sometimes they’re elated, sometimes they’re murderers, sometimes they’re policemen — they’re very rarely ordinary people having a nice day doing something happy. That’s not what people write stories about. So, I’m pretty used to having a very, very extreme experience at work and then, when someone says ‘cut,’ letting it go. My wife and children and dog and mother in-law wouldn’t put up with anything else.”

That said, filming The White Lotus came with its own set of challenges. For one, signing onto the show meant spending seven months away from home, sequestered inside a hotel with the cast and crew. Isaacs likens the experience to “a cross between high school and Lord of the Flies.”

They moved on occasion — he recalls filming in three or four different hotels — but Isaacs describes an almost claustrophobic atmosphere behind the scenes. “We never got away from each other!” Isaacs laughs. “Sometimes, it was two weeks of night shoots and then you see each other all day every day. In that time, it’s incredibly hot — not fun hot, holiday hot — we’re in costume and makeup, and we’re not meant to get a tan or lie by the pool (and you can only have so many massages).” The cozy off-screen dynamic struck a chord with the show, he adds. “There was a pressure cooker atmosphere, not just to the story we were telling, but to our own lives. People are away from home. It’s hot, people are drinking wine at night,” explains the actor. “There’s an offscreen White Lotus as much as an onscreen White Lotus — just with slightly fewer body bags — to navigate and to add to the intensity of the whole experience, which is not something I’m used to. Normally, you go home.”

Of course, the actor has had extended work trips in the past: 2003’s Peter Pan was a fourteen month affair. Still, he recalls renting a house with family during production. Only one project compares to the close quarters of The White Lotus: Fran Kranz’s Mass, a 2021 drama shot in Hailey, Idaho. “It was a beautiful film. There were four of us in it. 
It’s a very intense, emotional experience. We spent all day, all night, every day, for the duration of the two weeks shoot, in service of this heartbreakingly brilliant script,” Isaacs remembers. “We lived it as we worked it. That brought an honesty and an integrity to it.”

Yet, filming in Thailand for seven months, The White Lotus was truly its own beast. “This was different,” Isaacs clarifies.
”It just made the experience very, very… intense.” When I ask how the show’s themes — identity, materialism, spirituality — impacted him, he says he’s unsure. Then, he says something that sticks with me.

“I worry about my kids’ future and the world. The personal odyssey is, ‘How do I feel grateful every day? How can I not be angry and resentful? How can I go to bed at night?’ There’s much discussion in the current world about self-esteem, amongst Millennials and Boomers and Gen Zs. Well, a good friend of mine said that if you want to feel self-esteem at night, do something esteemable during the day. It’s not something you think yourself into. So I try and be grateful,” he says, adding: “But, you know, actors have more time to think about that stuff because we don’t work a lot of the time. [Laughs]. We spend a lot of time sitting around sticking our thumbs up our arses, you know? There’s time for plenty of introspection.”

“Don’t begin to bother comparing it with [past seasons] or any of the characters with other characters. Just sit and have that very rare experience of knowing you’re in incredibly safe and brilliant hands, and enjoy the ride.”

Jason Isaacs

Even if the last part is true (and with a slew of projects to his name, Isaacs hardly has an excess of downtime), the show has brought plenty of fodder for gratitude. Friendships are the first thing on the list; an intense filming experience yields close bonds. “It’s slightly pathetic and you must include, if you decide to write this, that I do understand quite how nauseating it is to read,” Isaacs starts, “but I kind of love my kids like they’re my kids. I took such parental pride when I was watching the episodes the other day in just how sensational they are, telling their stories in their very different ways.”

He recalls late nights with Patrick Schwarzenegger, Sam Nivola, and Sarah Catherine Hook, going over lines and talking through upcoming scenes. “They, like all actors and artists, get a little bit neurotic and anxious about the work,” Isaacs says. “I love to talk about those things, and so watching those scenes, [they] just kill it on the screen. I was just glowing the other day.”

As for the finished product? “I can only say that it’s [Mike White’s] best one yet,” says Isaacs. “Don’t begin to bother comparing it with [past seasons] or any of the characters with other characters. Just sit and have that very rare experience of knowing you’re in incredibly safe and brilliant hands, and enjoy the ride.”

See Our Rapid Fire Q&A With Jason Isaacs Below:

Shot on location at Chateau Marmont.