SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers for the Season 3 finale of “The White Lotus,” now streaming on Max.
Barring the people wheeled out in body bags, did anyone have a worse trip to Thailand than Saxon Ratliff?
Played by Patrick Schwarzenegger, the ambitious and vapid young finance bro took hit after hit in the third season of “The White Lotus” — be it rejection from the ladies, judgment from his disappointed little sister, lies from his spiraling white-collar criminal dad and, as you might have heard, a hand job from his younger brother while they both were flying on molly.
In Sunday’s compelling season finale, Schwarzenegger delivered some late-breaking and deftly acted developments to Saxon’s arc. His vacation crush Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood) has plied him with spiritual books that just may have convinced him that true love is what he should be after. Tired of his avoidance and hostility, his brother Lochlan (Sam Nivola) confronts Saxon about their sexual encounter, who then reveals his desire to live in denial forever about the incident. Worst of all, perhaps, he ends up as the only family member who seems to understand the gravity of his father Timothy’s (Jason Isaac) financial crimes and how it will permanently change the trajectory of their lives.
Schwarzenegger caught up with Variety an hour after the shocking final episode to discuss backlash to the incest plot, how he envisions Saxon getting by without money or status — and the entire hour cut out of creator Mike White’s coda.
Let’s talk about the confrontation between Saxon and Lochlan. Lochlan explains to Saxon that he performed that sex act on his brother because he’s a “pleaser.” What did you make of that?
The power dynamics between brothers completely changed after Episode 6. Lochlan is really trying to say he’s caught in the middle of everyone in the family, constantly trying to please them. In this case, quite literally. Mike White does such an amazing job writing, and the theme of the season is that you enter the White Lotus as one person and you leave as another.
The scene with me and Sam in the finale is kind of a period at the end of a sentence. There’s some kind of closure, even though Saxon can’t confront what happened between them. He can’t look his brother in the eye. He begs to have them live in denial forever. It’s a sweet but odd moment — Lochlan telling his brother that he knows he just wants to get off.
Did you and Sam ever talk to Mike about what Saxon and Lochlan’s sexual orientation might be?
No. One of my audition scenes was the scene by the pool, when the when the two girls are interrogating me saying they didn’t force me to kiss my brother. I’m like, “Yeah, you did,” And then they say, “Well, we didn’t make him jerk you off.” At the time, I didn’t know if that was them messing with me, or if it had actually happened until I booked the role. We didn’t have necessarily conversations before that, but on the day we shot it we wanted to make sure everyone was comfortable. Particularly Charlotte [Le Bon], because we were all in bed together.
I was listening to a podcast last week, and someone suggested that the uproar over the incest in the show is rooted in the fact that it’s two men — as opposed to something like “Game of Thrones,” which had an incestuous brother and sister and didn’t take as much heat.
Well, we have to remember “Game of Thrones” was a totally different world. It’s a different setting, a period fantasy. This is hitting way harder, because it’s current. But I mean sure, if it’s because its two brothers or guy-on-guy, I think it’s just the current state of what the show is.
You’ve been a good sport about people like your brother-in-law Chris Pratt and your dad seeing your nude scenes on the show. Does it make it easier to watch using prosthetics?
I don’t know that it made it easier, but at the end of the day I’m playing a character. It’s uncomfortable, but it’s not me. I put my trust in Mike, and he’s continuing to push the envelope. I was shocked at how well it worked out. The first four episodes, I had people coming up to me nonstop telling me how much they hated my character. That I was playing such a great douche bag, and all these different things. But that past four weeks, I’ve had people come up saying, “I feel so much for your character. He’s going through so much. I can’t believe I’m rooting for Saxon.” It’s been so cool to see how much the audience has invested.
Let’s talk about your incredible scene watching Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood) and Rick (Walton Goggins) reunite on the beach. There are heartbreaking closeups on your face. What is he thinking in that moment?
It’s longing. Over the last two episodes, he starts to form a more meaningful relationship with Chelsea. She opens him up by giving him books, and he’s exposed to the fact that she believes Rick is her soulmate. She’s really in love, and Saxon doesn’t understand that. He’s always laughing or scoffing at that those things, but he watches her actually run off into the sunset and jump into Rick’s arms. They have this moment, forehead to forehead, and he thinks, “Wow. Maybe this is what I want.”
I actually played a version of that scene where it’s full come-to-Jesus, where Saxon is just so sweet to the girls. Mike came up and said, no, he didn’t want me to play it like that. He didn’t want some huge change for Saxon yet — just a small moment and to hold on my face as I watch her go off into the distance.
I wanted so much more information about what the Ratliffs were going to walk into once they got off that boat. I would love to have seen some fake headlines. Where do you think Saxon ends up, and will he be able to function in poverty?
There’s so much I wish I knew! I just watched the finale. I wonder if Saxon knew that Chelsea died. And when we power our phones on, is that when we know everything about our dad? Mike likes ambiguity. He wants people to have these conversations. He shot two-and-a-half hours for the finale and boiled it down to 90 minutes. That’s already a stretch for HBO to give.
Was there ever a conversation about more exposition on that final boat ride for the Ratliffs?
It was always scripted how it aired. Mike did say he wanted it to be me who looks to my dad after my phone comes on — because they work together and there are more consequences for Saxon.
The Ratliffs seem like a capitalist cautionary tale, and there were instant reactions online that this story wraps up as global markets are in a meltdown. Do you think Mike is trying to say something political here?
I see that Ratliffs posing a question about, what if everything that you thought you stood for is taken away? They believe that money, jobs, power, status makes them who they are. Who are they really? You can talk about capitalism and people who think money is everything, but a lot times you discover that those things don’t bring eternal happiness. What I loved about Saxon is that he came in with this bravado about money and sex. He enters the most confident, and leaves the most confused. It’s also what makes that confrontation with his brother so powerful, they literally change roles. Saxon has a full on internal crisis.
If Saxon can’t outrun his dad’s scandal and has to get a regular job to survive, what do you see him doing? I think bartender, for some reason.
I don’t know that the entire family will ever recover from the shock. I told Mike, they should put out an April Fool’s story that there will be a Ratliff spinoff, like a fake reality show about that. It would be so funny.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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