With its combination of biting dialogue and beautiful beaches, The White Lotus became a sleeper television hit in the summer of 2021. No surprise then, that HBO has decided to renew Mike White’s hotel-set series, which gave actors like Connie Britton, Sydney Sweeney, Steve Zahn and Jennifer Coolidge plum roles. A unique blend of intense psychodrama and incisive commentary on class divides made the show feel contemporary and urgent, even with its escapist setting
. White Lotus is going the anthology route, which means that the second season will take place in a new hotel with an all-new cast. And like Succession and Knives Out 2 before it, The White Lotus has been dropping intriguing actor announcements on a steady basis.
October 15, 2021.Anthology format notwithstanding, beloved season one standout Jennifer Coolidge will be returning. She earned major praise for her role as the wealthy but teetering solo guest Tanya McQuoid, with The New Yorker calling it “the greatest role of her career” and New York dropping a long profile. Coolidge received a Golden Globe nomination for her performance, and hopefully this new season continues to give her moments as rich as the scene where she scatters her mother’s ashes or her excellent arrival at the resort.
January 5, 2022 Prestige TV royalty Michael Imperioli will play Dominic Di Grasso, a man traveling with his older father and 20-something son. (Imperioli is also working on another HBO series about his experience with Buddhism, so we might be seeing a lot of him soon.)
January 10, 2022:
The White Lotus gets its highest-profile new star, with Aubrey Plaza announced in the role of Harper Spiller, a woman vacationing with her husband and his pals. Her quick, deadpan comic delivery makes her a natural fit for a Mike White project, though the two have never worked together before.
January 18, 2022:
The latest spate of featured actors includes Academy Award-winner( and Mythic Quest MVP) F. Murray Abraham and Haley Lu Richardson, who has shown excellent comedic chops in films like Unpregnant and Support the Girls. Other new additions include Adam DiMarco of The Magicians and Tom Hollander of Rev. and not-being-Spider-Man fame.
Abraham plays the father of Imperioli’s character, while DiMarco plays his grandson. Richardson will star as Portia, a woman traveling alongside her boss, while Hollander plays a British man traveling with his friends and nephew. Beyond the cast announcements, that report cited a source revealing that the new season will be set in Italy. (It certainly seemed like the Succession cast enjoyed their time abroad.)