The cast of The White Lotus have called the seven month shoot in the heat of Thailand ‘intense’, ‘claustophobic’ and a ‘Truman Show social experiment.
Mike White flew his cast to the Four Seasons Resort on Koh Samui, where they both stayed and filmed the third season.
And whilst the setting was intense, thanks in part to the stifling Thai temperatures, the blurred boundaries between work and play meant the friendships formed during filming also took on an unusual closeness.
Jason Isaacs who plays troubled family patriarch Tim Ratliff, has summed up the shoot as ‘a cross between summer camp and Lord of the Flies but in a gilded cage’.
Aimee Lou Wood, who plays the tragic fan favourite Chelsea, meanwhile has described how the cast ‘wrap and walk five steps to your room. You’re living where you’re filming. It is the Truman Show.’
And there is one intense friendship circle at the centre of the cast bond.
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The cast of The White Lotus have called the seven month shoot in the heat of Thailand ‘intense’, ‘claustophobic’ and a ‘Truman Show social experiment with intense friendships formed – pictured Walton Goggins, Aimee Lou Wood and Leslie Bibb on set
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Walton and Sam Rockwell, who guest starred as Frank, ave been close friends for 15 years after meeting on the set of 2011 movie Cowboys and Aliens
Walton Goggins, who stars as doomed Rick, his onscreen lover Aimee Lou, Leslie Bibb, who plays Kate and Sam Rockwell who guest starred as Frank have a tangled web of friendship.
Walton and Sam have been close friends for 15 years after meeting on the set of 2011 movie Cowboys and Aliens.
Despite Sam’s partner of 18 years Leslie starring in White Lotus, it was his pal not his girlfriend who made sure Sam signed up for his scene-stealing role on the show.
Leslie has admitted that whilst she tried to persuade her boyfriend, who was juggling filming another project in South Africa at the time, to say yes to Mike White Walton was the one who ultimately convinced him.
‘I think [it was] Walton really, because they’re very good friends, wanted to have that experience with him,’ she told InStyle.
But Walton called that experience of working with his best friend both a ‘positive and a negative’ admitting he had ‘anxiety’ about living up to his ‘hero’.
‘He has been one of my best and dearest friends over the last 15 years of my life. So that is both a positive and a negative in the sense that we haven’t worked together since then,’ Walton mused to Vanity Fair.
‘Further complicating this collaboration is that Sam is my hero. He’s really one of the guys in my generation that I look up to, and he knows that. So coming into this experience, there was a certain amount of anxiety, meaning I didn’t want to let my friend down.’
Has Walton Goggins BLOCKED Aimee Lou Wood on Instagram?
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Mike White flew his cast to the Four Seasons Resort on Koh Samui, where they both stayed and filmed the third season
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Despite Sam’s partner of 18 years Leslie starring in White Lotus, it was his pal not his girlfriend who made sure Sam signed up for his scene-stealing role on the show
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Before his friend Sam got to set, Walton leaned on his close bond with Sam’s partner Leslie, who he has regularly referred to as his ‘sister’ in interviews
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After cementing her bond with Walton, Leslie then drew Aimee Lou Wood into the circle
In the end the two relalised that the relationship between their characters Rick and Frank mirrored a lot of their own feelings for one another.
‘We talked a lot right before he got there about what that relationship symbolizes, where they fit into each other’s lives. And the very first day on the set, there was a comfort and a level of listening and respect and genuine love and affection for each other that permeates their entire friendship.’
Before his friend Sam got to set, Walton leaned on his close bond with Sam’s girlfriend Leslie, who he has regularly referred to as his ‘sister’ in interviews.
Leslie seemed to provide Walton with a safe, known haven, as has admitted he gave himself the challenge of isolating himself on set, in part because of his method style of working.
Speaking on The White Lotus companion podcast, the actor explained how ‘showing up to work every day with 18 people and a green room that’s full of chairs of 18 people that are in a much different place emotionally than I am at the beginning of the story was very difficult… More often than not, my chair is separate.’
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The two actress’ revealed their closeness on set led to them sharing rooms, throwing parties together and holidaying in Tokyo during a break from filming
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Aimee has confessed that she, Leslie and Walton dubbed themselves the ‘Scorpio three’ on set, thanks to their shared star signs
‘I sit on my own. I do my own thing… But I just couldn’t, I couldn’t be around them. They didn’t understand why I was there. This guy is isolated… And that wasn’t any fun, you know, to separate yourself from a group in that way. That was really, really challenging.’
After cementing her bond with Walton, Leslie then drew Aimee Lou Wood into the circle, with the two actress’ revealing their closeness on set led to them sharing rooms, throwing parties together and holidaying in Tokyo during a break from filming.
Aimee has even confessed that she, Leslie and Walton dubbed themselves the ‘Scorpio three’ on set, thanks to their shared star signs.
‘We had a group called Jackson Browne, because we used to just sit and listen to Jackson Browne, drink cocktails and eat fries,’ she spilled.
Leslie shared equally glowing words about the trio’s friendship, gushing to Elle that ‘Aimee Lou has become so kindred with me, and Walton is like family. I can’t see anything happen to them.’
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Whilst Walton, Aimee Lou, Leslie and Sam have all gushed about their tight bond during filming, some of those friendships have fragmented since the shoot wrapped
But whilst Walton, Aimee Lou, Leslie and Sam have all gushed about their tight bond during filming, some of those friendships have fragmented since the shoot wrapped.
This week fans speculated that Walton has blocked Aimee Lou on Instagram, amid rumours of a huge feud.
Aimee Lou, who boasts 2.6m Instagram followers, has been passionately sharing behind the scenes photos and reposts from her co-stars throughout the third season, with Walton also sharing his own set memories.
And in their posts they have both enthusiastically tagged their co-stars – every one but each other.
They are both still following all the other cast members from the show.
Several online gossip sites have posted blind items purported to be about the pair which has fuelled speculation of a falling out.
Now, Reddit, TikTok, and X are full of threads dedicated to theories about why the pair may have had a behind-the-scenes falling-out.
One user shared on Reddit: ‘I feel like no one is talking about the falling out of them?
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This week fans speculated that Walton has blocked Aimee Lou on Instagram, amid rumours of a huge feud
‘They unfollowed each other on Insta a couple weeks ago, Walton posts White Lotus stuff and tags everyone in the photos except Aimee Lou Wood, posts a whole tribute to White Lotus and still doesn’t tag her, posts tons of pictures of her on his story in a commemorative tribute to the show. What happened?’
Another X user wrote in amazement: ‘Aimee Lou Wood follows 5,160 people on instagram and none of them are Walton Goggins…
On X, one viewer weighed in on an album of behind-the-scenes photos Walton had posted to Instagram.
‘Walton Goggins not tagging Aimee but tagging everyone else… WHAT HAPPENED,’ they wrote.
Particularly perplexing to some fans was how Walton had apparently posted a sweet — and extensive — set of photos of himself and Aimee to his Instagram Stories, set to the soundtrack of a famous break up song.
‘Obsessed with Walton Goggins posting an 18 slide instagram story of photos of him and Aimee Lou Wood set to Silver Springs by Fleetwood Mac….’ one X user wrote in astonishment.
