Before I finish with WHITE LOTUS (until Season 3!), this week I want to point out a couple last things that I really enjoyed.
Today, it's about the openings of episodes. Part of the premise of the show is that we follow the characters day to day over the course of their whole vacation. So episode one is when they arrive. Episode two is Day Two, etc.
And each episode also follows the same pattern. We start with the characters waking up (or it being morning, anyway). We watch them have their breakfast. They go off and have a day. They have dinner at night, and maybe more.
That simple choice to structure the episodes in a repeated pattern has a great impact on the story. More specifically, it creates a sort of template for each character that makes any changes in them stand out more clearly.
Take Ethan. We learn on Day Two how he begins his morning. he takes a run before Harper gets up, comes back when she's gone, and jerks off to porn before he's caught by Harper.
We don't know if that's how he is every day, but because that's what we're given on that first morning, it's the thing we're going to compare each next day to. And so the next day he does the run, but when he comes back Harper is there, looking sexy, wanting him to want her. And he ignores it. Which underlines an important point: while Ethan desires to have sex after a run, he doesn't desire to have sex with his wife.
Each next morning is going to start with Ethan in the bedroom. And the scene that ensues is going to be about Harper and sex. In episode 4 he's still in bed when Harper calls, his personal pattern completely out the window by his night with Cameron, Mia and Lucia. (It's the first signal that the wheels are coming off for him.) And the conversation is all about sex without ever saying it; she's worried he slept with someone. He's freaked out that he was with Cameron and the ladies.
Episode 5 is going to start for Ethan with him discovering the condom that Harper found in the room, and a conversation about whether or not he slept with either of the ladies. In episode 6, Harper wakes up to find Ethan moping because he can't get it out of his head that Harper still doesn't believe him. (Ethan, ugh.) Which leads to a conversation about what? What to do with the fact that Ethan is no longer sexually attracted to Harper—exactly where episode 1 and 2 told us we were going.
And then at the start of episode 7 we watch him doom-fantasizing about Cameron and Harper having sex, his patterns completely forgotten and his brain pretty much unhinged.
The show doesn't spotlight the way each Ethan opening scene is set in the bedroom and is about his sexual relationship with his wife. It's more like an Easter egg for us to discover; but I think it also helps Mike White to understand and organize his show. He goes into the writing of each next episode knowing Ethan's first scene has to be in the bedroom, and it has to be about his sex life with Harper.
A repeated situation gives us something to compare to. It helps focus character arcs, both for the audience and for the writer.
Here's one more: Valentina. She's not staying at the hotel, so her pattern is totally different. Her first beats are almost always about walking into the hotel lobby at the beginning of the day, and they emphasize two things: the way she treats her employees, and her connection (or lack thereof) with everyone else.
Episode 1 sets the pattern: she's standing there with her staff, waiting to greet her guests, and she's unreasonably rough on them. She wants things perfect, and also she apparently doesn't care that it alienates them. Episode 2 we see the same thing as she comes into the lobby: harsh comments, deep investment in being professional, and in the end she's at her desk standing, all alone. That last beat, that's her problem in a nutshell, and the journey Mike White is going to take her on: from severity and loneliness to vulnerability and love. And each day, what is usually her first scene in the lobby is going to key, as her employee Isabella says nice things to her and Valentina ends up falling for her.
It's interesting, though, on day 5, before the lobby she runs into Mia. Really that scene is Mia's; she's the one with the goal—to get to play while Guiseppe is recovering. But Valentina's approach with her is also completely different than what we've seen before. Instead of being abrupt and dismissive, she's softer. And as she's talking to Mia she puts on lip balm. It's the most feminine thing we've seen her do.
Obviously, that's not about Mia, it's about looking good for Isabella. But the fact that Valentina is willing to show herself getting ready like that is itself a step forward. Actually it's probably the kind of thing she'd yell at her employees for.
And that moment makes episode 7's opening that much sweeter: first of all, for the first time she's not at her post, or even on her way there. No, she's woken up by the cleaning lady in a hotel room that she has snuck into. She's chucked aside any trace of her professionalism.
And who is she with? Not Isabella, but Mia, the girl before whom she was willing to be more normal and vulnerable. The girl she told to call her by her name.
Maybe the most surprising thing of all, after the cleaning lady leaves Valentina doesn't freak out. She's happy. And when she goes to her post, looking pretty much a mess—again, such a change—she remains happy.
Once again, the pattern of the episodes creates a sort of platform to see the arc of the character. As her behavior (and look) changes in that opening beat, we see her journey progressing.
I'm going to talk about the repeated structure a little more next time, and then end on a conversation that I really like.
Until then, ciao!
