Evan Ross Katz
Appearances
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Enlightened ran for two seasons before getting canceled, much to the disappointment of fans. I'm still mad.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Around this time, Mike made a perhaps unexpected career move. He went on reality TV, first appearing on two seasons of The Amazing Race, and then, memorably, on Survivor.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
David Bernard saw Mike through his whole Survivor adventure.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
They're seemingly strange bedfellows, Survivor and The White Lotus. And yet I feel like they are a great double feature. Do you see similarities between the two shows?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
For those of you who are familiar with my work, you might know that my dedication to Survivor goes way beyond fandom. I'm a connoisseur of the show. I even have my own podcast dedicated to it called Drop Your Buffs. You could say I'm kind of obsessive. So when I knew we'd be talking about Mike's time on Survivor, there were two people I absolutely knew we had to get.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Angelina Keely and Alec Merlino both joined Mike during the David vs. Goliath season of Survivor. The three of them kept in touch afterward. So much so that Mike actually invited Alec to appear on season one of The White Lotus in a small role, and then invited Angelina, as well as another cast member, Cara, onto season two. But before that, they were just strangers meeting on an island.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
As pals of Mike, alums of Survivor, and devoted fans of The White Lotus, both Angelina and Alec can easily spot the parallels between these two shows.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
I also asked Mike about the White Lotus survivor parallels, which many of us super fans were quick to spot. And he had a pretty good response.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
As Mike's Survivor episodes were airing week by week, there was one oust that caused quite a stir among fans. When Mike went after Survivor favorite Christian, ultimately blindsiding him and getting him eliminated from the game. After the flack Mike got following Chuck and Buck, it was like bad deja vu.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
When I interviewed Mike, he was in the midst of editing the final episode of season three. He'd literally just been at the editing suite when we logged on. He said he'd been working nearly nonstop and that he was burnt out. And so, as we talked through his trajectory, feelings started to bubble up.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
We know that Mike being a one-stop shop has been paying off. I mean, clearly, it's given us pure and unadulterated Mike White in every episode of The White Lotus. But the pressure was also taking a toll. He was stressed. He was exhausted. He was, you might say, in survivor mode.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Mike's father, Mel White, was a minister and deeply embedded in the local Christian community. As such, religion played an integral role in Mike's upbringing.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
It was startling to hear Mike so overwhelmed. But as he spoke, I couldn't stop thinking about how, even amid the stress, he curated such a joyful experience for each and every one of his collaborators. And I didn't just think that. I'd been told it.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
I wanted to express to Mike what he meant to these people, to give him some of that perspective he was perhaps lacking. I gave it my best shot. I have to tell you, Mike, actors don't often talk about their experiences working on shows with as high of regard as they do when it comes to not just The White Lotus, just working with you in general. People really seem to like working with you.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Not just the writing, not just the characters that you create. They like working with you. The vibe that you create on set, being around you. I don't think that that's common.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
And that's it for the White Lotus Look Back podcast. I have so enjoyed riding this wave with you all, and I can't wait to watch and talk and meme out season three with all of you. I don't have any spoilers, but I did hear that someone dies. The White Lotus Podcast is a production of HBO and Campside Media. This episode was hosted by me, Evan Ross Katz, and produced by Natalia Wingelmann.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Our associate producer is Aaliyah Papes. Fact-checking by Gray Lanta. At Campside Media, our executive producer is Josh Dean. Editing and sound design by Ewen Lai-Tremuwen. Special thanks to Michael Gluckstadt, Alison Cohen-Sarokach, and Kenya Reyes from the HBO Podcast team.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
He received an introduction to playwriting at a young age by his second grade teacher, who happened to be the mother of the playwright and actor Sam Shepard. Very, very L.A.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Mike went on to attend Wesleyan University, a liberal arts college in Connecticut. Culturally, it was a sea change.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Hi, everyone. I'm Evan Ross Katz, and welcome to the final Look Back episode of The White Lotus official podcast from HBO. I know, bittersweet. Mike White, the show's writer, director, and creator, was a success story in Hollywood long before The White Lotus. He'd made movies and television and had even competed on reality shows.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
During his freshman spring at Wesleyan, Mike met Meredith Tucker in an acting class. She was a history major while Mike was studying theater. Meredith would go on to become a casting director and eventually cast The White Lotus. But before all that, they were theater buddies.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
After college, Mike thought he might move to New York to pursue playwriting. Instead, the movie business beckoned and he returned to his West Coast roots.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
When Mike was 24, his dad Mel came out as gay. In the whites' conservative Christian community, Mel's coming out was a bombshell.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
I'll let him tell you a little bit more about Mill.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
But he was catapulted to a whole new echelon of stardom in 2021 when The White Lotus made him a household name. By that point, I'd been covering pop culture and entertainment for over a decade. I knew that nobody was doing it quite like him. One thing that makes Mike's projects so distinctly Mike White is that he tends to work as a one-stop shop, an anomaly in Hollywood.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
In 2000, Mike made the movie that you might call his big break, the indie black comedy Chuck and Buck, which he both wrote and starred in. The story follows a 27-year-old amateur playwright who's essentially stalking his childhood best friend, a guy he'd experimented with sexually when they were younger.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
The movie premiered at Sundance. In the indie world, it was a minor sensation, but it also earned Mike a lot of flack.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Mike went on to write a bunch more movies in his developing voice, including Orange County, The Good Girl, and his biggest hit to date, School of Rock, in which Mike played the unforgettable Ned Schneebly.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
In 2004, he came out with Cracking Up, a sitcom on Fox about a wacky rich family in Beverly Hills. Molly Shannon played the mom.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
Most TV these days is made by teams. Scripts are crafted by writers' rooms and a roster of directors tackle each season of episodes. Given the array of talent, it's sometimes hard to tell which ideas come from where or who to credit for what. But Mike, he spins all those plates, all on his own.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
After Cracking Up finished, Mike contacted Molly with an idea for a new movie, Year of the Dog, about a secretary whose dog dies. This time, Mike directed the movie too.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
This brings us to the 2010s, when Mike got to work developing his most ambitious project to date, his first series for HBO, Enlightened. I talked to the critic and writer Hunter Harris about the show's cultural significance and how it relates to the White Lotus.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 7: The Mike White-iverse
So today, for our grand finale, we're taking a step back to a pre-White Lotus era to retrace the work and life experiences that shaped Mike's earlier career. Because to understand the White Lotus, you have to understand Mike White. Mike's story starts in the 1970s in the foothills of Pasadena near Sierra Madre Eaton Canyon, just a five-minute walk from the forest.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
The very first viral Tanya line actually occurs in that scene, her memorable wee-hee moment.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
I asked her about that line.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Tanya ends season one with Greg, leaving Belinda and her business dreams behind.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
She returns in season two with Greg, now her husband, excited to embark on a Sicilian adventure straight out of a Michelangelo Antonioni movie. For Jennifer, it was an intense experience, which made it all the easier to get into character.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
And it's not just me that thinks this. Those fortunate enough to occupy her circle can all see the special glow she emits. Everyone who meets Jen has an instantly iconic Coolidge story. Just take it from Lucas Gage.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Yeah, we were. Wow. Yeah. That's adventurous. Yeah.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
When Tanya returns for season two in Sicily, she has a new character in tow, her beleaguered Gen Z assistant, Portia, played by Haley Lou Richardson.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Hayley Liu told me that in her scenes with Jennifer, there were many, many times when Jennifer would go off on a hilarious improv tangent. And in those moments, Hayley didn't even attempt to get on Jen's level.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
As season two unfolds, Mike White drops many hints that this time around, Tanya is going to be the one who ends up dead. Maybe the most obvious signposting are the many allusions to Madame Butterfly, the famous Puccini opera about a woman who kills herself after her husband leaves her for another woman.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
In a late episode, Quentin, played by Tom Hollander, takes Tanya to see Madame Butterfly on stage in Palermo, and Tanya is moved to tears. Only later does Tanya find out that Quentin isn't her friend, and that he's actually plotting to kill her for her fortune. I hate when that happens.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Now, we'll get to that chaotic confrontation with the evil gays in just a moment. But first, I have to rewind to when Mike was wrapping up the first season and was busy figuring out his next moves with HBO.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Now look, the minute I saw the Tanya death episode, I knew. Instant classic. Who else but Mike White could write a line like, these gays, they're trying to murder me, and have us cheer her on? Jen recalls that Mike was excited about how the sequence turned out, too.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Dan Savage touched on the trope of the evil gays as well.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Now, of course, movie and TV scenes are often shot out of order to make things easier on the production end, which means that the last scene Jennifer ever shot for The White Lotus wasn't actually her death scene, but a dinner scene between Tanya and Greg. I asked John Grice about the days leading up to that final shot.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Did you two commiserate at all about Episode 7? No.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
When I sat down with Jen for this podcast, we both knew it was going to be one of the last times she'd be interviewed at length about her White Lotus experience. So I started off by asking, how is she feeling about it all? What is your relationship like to this show with all of this time to reflect on the experience? Do you like the prospect of revisiting these two seasons?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Is this a fun conversation? Is this a difficult one?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
But listen, Jennifer Coolidge isn't just an incredible person to be around. She's also a wildly talented performer. On the screen, she's been a scene stealer since her breakout guest appearance on Seinfeld in 1993. After that came a string of unforgettable roles in films like American Pie, Best in Show, Legally Blonde, and A Cinderella Story.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
In your defense, I feel like so often at the tail end of that press cycle, it was you being relentlessly asked the same question about, are you sad about Tanya's death? Are you sad you're not going to be continuing on? So I felt like you were pigeonholed in terms of not being asked about the joy of being on these two seasons and celebrating that. It became very, well, are you sad not to be back?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Which sort of put you in a corner in terms of how you were able to look at it as a whole. Did you feel that way?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
I'm wondering, there's just a level of vulnerability that was required to play this part. And it's a side of you I'd never seen in any of your previous performances. And I'm wondering what it was like for you to have to go to these places with this character. Do you feel like you'd ever been asked to go to these places before in roles you'd played?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
And yet, for much of her career, Coolidge was often relegated to side characters. You know, the one who comes in, steals the show, and is gone by the time you can wipe the tears of laughter from your eyes. For gay men like myself, there's always been a certain Judy Garland-esque appeal to Coolidge, and a sixth sense that she was capable of far more than what she'd been given.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
I discussed that appeal with Dan Savage, the sex and relationships advice columnist you heard from last episode.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
This is David Bernard, the producer of The White Lotus. I talked to him about his and Mike's friendship with Jen.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Before The White Lotus, Mike pitched around a series called The Tears of St. Patsy, which was set to star Jennifer. Hollywood passed on the opportunity, unwisely I might say, but it did leave things open for Mike to bring Jen into the fold on his pandemic show, The White Lotus. Enter Tanya McQuad, the deeply troubled, emotionally fragile, needy and self-absorbed heiress of the White Lotus.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
This was the role of a lifetime for Jen, and one that in many senses felt predestined. Here, finally, was the moment she could step into the spotlight that had long been waiting for her.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
One person who got to know Jennifer and Tanya very well was John Grice.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
On The White Lotus, John played Greg, a buttoned-up government professional who meets Tanya in season one and ends up married to her.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
During season one, I remember a big question rattling around with viewers was, does Greg actually like Tanya? I posed that question to John himself. I'm wondering, what was your interpretation of that in season one?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Hello, I'm Evan Ross Katz, and welcome back to the White Lotus official podcast, specifically to the episode that we've all been waiting for. Okay, maybe not all of us, but definitely me. That's because today we're talking Jennifer Coolidge and Tanya.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Tanya spends a lot of season one latched onto Belinda, the resort spa employee played by Natasha Rothwell. Ultimately, she manipulates her, taking a long time to consider funding Belinda's own spa before reneging on the offer. Here's Natasha Rothwell.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
For those of you gunning to hear from the woman herself, I did get the chance to talk all things Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge, after she had a little trouble finding the studio.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
As I mentioned in our first episode, Jennifer Coolidge and I initially met via Instagram. But we really became friends some months later after we hung out and hit it off. Or rather, that's how I would describe it. She might say, like, I just wouldn't leave her alone. People always ask me what Jen is like as a person. Is she similar to Tanya? Is she different from her?
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
I think it's just a you thing, but I think it's a quirk. Jennifer told me that she was gratified that viewers gave Tanya a pass despite Tanya's, how shall we say, chronic obliviousness.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
Looking back over Tanya's most iconic moments, there's one thing that stands out. Tanya spends some memorable time on boats. And one thing I know about Jennifer, she gets very, very seasick.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
One of these boat scenes occurs in season one on a sunset cruise. Shane and Rachel, the honeymoon couple, are trying to have a romantic dinner. Tanya, on the other hand, is there in full funeral attire to scatter her mother's ashes.
The White Lotus Official Podcast
Episode 5: Tanya with Jennifer Coolidge
And I often have a hard time explaining her je ne sais quoi. The best that I can do is that I'm never more alive than when I'm with her. Truly. A mutual friend of ours once said to me that getting to be around Jen is like when you randomly encounter a butterfly. It's special and magical, and then the butterfly has to fly away to do butterfly things. That's Jen.