We Desperately Want These ‘White Lotus’ Season 3 Casting Rumors to Be True

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A masterful mix of wealth-voyeurism, relationship comedy, and high-strung drama, Mike White’s vacation anthology series The White Lotus has been one of HBO’s biggest hits in the 2020s. Each season has thrown a multi-generational murderer’s row of actors together to chew beachside scenery in a lavish setting. Though there’s often a central mystery driving the tension, it’s ultimately a show about relationships, which means casting is absolutely crucial. There’s still not much concrete information out there about the show’s third season, but casting rumors have consistently set the internet aflame, and there’s a particularly juicy list circulating now. According to a tipster quoted by celebrity gossip panopticon Deux Moi, the cast for the show’s third season will include Parker Posey, Walton Goggins, Woody Harrelson, Carrie Coon, Jason Isaacs, Michelle Monaghan, Patrick Schwarzenegger, and Aimee Lou Wood, among others. Several of these stars were subsequently confirmed by Variety, including Monaghan, Isaacs, and Posey, as well as Tayme Thapthimthong, Dom Hetrakul, and Leslie Bibb.

Of these reported cast members, Posey, Goggins, and Wood all seem like terrific fits for White’s acerbic series, which plays with classic upstairs-downstairs tropes by embroiling both the wealthy vacationers and the working class folks at the resort in an escalating (and frequently deadly) set of stakes. Posey has been selective with her recent work, but had a memorable turn in last year’s Beau is Afraid, while Goggins is already an HBO featured player thanks to his work on The Righteous Gemstones and Vice Principals, and an actor capable of selling both comedic absurdity and genuine menace. Wood broke out in the ribald Netflix comedy Sex Education, and starred in the quietly excellent mortality drama Living opposite Bill Nighy. Patrick Schwarzenegger could be either the handsome young man with a sinister secret (Season 2’s Theo James or Leo Woodall), or a more wide-eyed character like Season 2’s Adam DiMarco. Variety also confirmed the return of Natasha Rothwell, who co-starred in the first season as the resort’s spa manager, and would be one of very few White Lotus characters to appear across multiple installments.

It’s easy to see how many of these characters could map onto existing White Lotus archetypes while still providing their own unique updates. Harrelson as the easy-breezy husband with a dark secret (think Steve Zahn in Season 1), Wood as the sardonic Gen Z girl ensconced in wealth beyond her means (Sydney Sweeney in Season 1, Haley Lu Richardson in Season 2). Coon or Posey as the successful, high-strung businesswoman attempting to relax (Connie Britton in Season 1). There’s no directly analogous character for Jennifer Coolidge’s iconic Tanya, but that’s probably for the best, since the character had an all-time ending in the finale of Season 2. (Coolidge did have a pretty excellent, if fantastical, idea for a potential return: “If Tanya could come back in any form, maybe she could come back as a seagull and poke [her husband] Greg’s eyes out.”)

The next season of the acclaimed anthology will take place in Thailand, with Deadline reporting that filming will begin early this year after delays due to the 2023 Writer’s Guild and SAG-AFTRA strikes. “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,” White said in a quote shared by Variety.

Hopefully at least a few of these actors wind up in the series, though for what it’s worth, our eyes (and ears) are on Cristobal Tapia de Veer, the composer behind the viral Season 2 theme, and if he can possibly top the thumping drums and hypnotic warbling that made it a social media phenomenon.

Originally Appeared on GQ