Behind the scenes of ‘The White Lotus’ with the real-life normal supervisor of the 4 Seasons Resort Koh Samui
It solely took 20 seconds for Mike White, the creator of “The White Lotus,” to solid the 4 Seasons Resort Koh Samui because the star character within the third installment of his hit HBO sequence.
“Arriving to the resort, you are standing on prime of a peak and you’ll see 43 acres of lush land [and] the Gulf of Thailand, and it is simply stunning total,” Jasjit Assi, the resort’s normal supervisor, advised TPG on a latest go to to New York Metropolis. “And when Mike walked in, he was simply silent for 20 seconds, and he mentioned, ‘That is it.'”
In all three seasons of “The White Lotus,” the fictional normal supervisor performs a key position: catering to haughty visitors, managing workers members who see and listen to all the pieces and, at instances, stepping into sticky conditions of their very own.
For Assi, who has labored with 4 Seasons, the posh hospitality model “The White Lotus” is unofficially primarily based on, for 18 years, it is easy to separate the TV normal managers — like Armond on Maui and Valentina in Sicily — from his real-life position as the first chief on the 4 Seasons Resort Koh Samui.
“Look,” mentioned Assi, who’s nothing just like the awkward, goofy normal supervisor of The White Lotus Koh Samui within the present. “‘White Lotus’ is supposed to entertain. There’s a little bit of exaggeration. It is a satire; it is a fictional drama sequence.”
However what’s actual, he insists, is the fantastic thing about the resort and the distinctive Thai hospitality you see all through the season.
“You might be seeing the resort play a personality,” he mentioned. “To take care of the fantastic thing about this resort, that is my position on this.”
After White “booked” the resort for the present, he reserved a keep for himself and “skilled all the pieces as a visitor,” Assi defined. He added that the 2 of them, together with White’s crew, “opened up each door that could possibly be opened” as Assi helped the workforce plan the right places for several types of scenes.
Then, in February and March 2024, the resort closed to the general public to remodel into “The White Lotus.” It stayed absolutely open, although, for the present’s solid.
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“In actuality, it was like working a correct resort daily,” Assi mentioned, though shoots had been taking place Monday by way of Friday.
On filming days, the 4 Seasons workers adjusted to satisfy the wants of the solid and crew’s wild filming schedule.
“No matter [the crew’s] wants had been, wherever they had been transferring across the resort, the workers was serving to them out to maneuver and arrange places,” he mentioned.
On the weekends, the celebs of the present “embraced the actual Thailand island life.” And, after 5 days of taking pictures, he defined, they wanted to loosen up.
“We handled them like regular visitors. They might go right down to the seashore. They had been ordering cocktails. They had been going into the spa,” Assi mentioned, noting that additionally they frolicked elsewhere on the island, like native eating places, “embracing actual life.”
Actually, he mentioned, they “felt like a part of the household.” A lot so, the truth is, that actor Parker Posey, whose journey to movie the present marked her first go to to Asia, “got here again to the resort to say thanks to the individuals who taken care of her” whereas returning to the island for a wellness retreat.
The 4 Seasons Resort Koh Samui workers may need tried to make the expertise on the resort as regular as potential for the solid and crew, however for them, enjoying host to one of many world’s hottest TV reveals required some adjustments.
“We needed to educate them, to be sincere,” Assi mentioned about his workers, a lot of whom did not perceive simply how large the present is — or that the present’s satirical take a look at its workers did not essentially symbolize them, the real-life individuals who make the resort so great.
Assi’s workers needed to be nimble, adjusting meals tailor-made to the solid’s on-set diets or serving to them plan days off. In addition they needed to vow to secrecy.
“We needed to signal a number of NDAs and confidentiality agreements,” he mentioned, explaining that his workers discovered learn how to be coy when visitors requested in the event that they had been going to movie “The White Lotus” there.
Now that folks know 4 Seasons Resort Koh Samui because the property from the present, the questions have modified. Individuals wish to know what villa the Ratliff household stayed in (a three-bedroom villa that begins at $8,000 per evening) or the place actor Patrick Schwarzenegger got here out of the pool shirtless.
“Company wish to [have] their very own ‘White Lotus’ experiences,” Assi careworn, noting that his workforce absolutely anticipated the drive in bookings the present would trigger — similar to the 4 Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea in Hawaii and San Domenico Palace, Taormina, A 4 Seasons Lodge in Sicily, Italy, skilled after their seasons as visitor stars.
And that is why 4 Seasons has been — and possibly will proceed to be — such an awesome accomplice for the present.
“The 4 Seasons philosophy has all the time been ‘inspiration by way of journey,'” Assi mentioned, “and I believe cinema on this age has [taken] it to the following stage. [Four Seasons] relies on the pillars of an awesome location, an awesome resort and nice service … [and with the show,] you possibly can see it.”
Now, with Season Three coming to an finish, simply do not ask Assi his ideas on the place Season 4 ought to happen. With amusing he mentioned, “Let me survive this one.”
The right way to guide: Charges at 4 Seasons Resort Koh Samui begin at $1,800 per evening for a pool villa.
Ebook by way of a program like American Specific Advantageous Lodges + Resorts or The Edit by Chase Journey to attain elitelike perks, reminiscent of room upgrades (when accessible), free breakfast, late checkout and property credit.
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