We could talk forever with Leslie Bibb. To be fair, we almost did. Last month, our interview, centered on her iconic performance as Kate in season three of Mike White’s celebrated “The White Lotus,” turned into a sprawling deep dive into the Austin socialite’s mindset over her weeklong stay at the fictional Thailand resort.
Bibb, who just finished filming the second season of Apple TV+’s “Palm Royale,” touched on a ton of topics including Kate’s trifecta relationship with her longtime friends Laurie (Carrie Coon), and Jaclyn (Michelle Monaghan), what was really happening in that awkward conversation between Victoria (Parker Posey) and Kate, why Kate is the only one who really doesn’t trust Valentin (Arnas Fedaravicius) and his Russian buddies, whether Kate is politically independent or not, how fans approach her over being a “Kate,” and so much more. I mean, seriously, so much more.
Oh, and this is a substantial edit of the conversation, but if you’ve been missing the “White Lotus” in your life, it will give you a satisfying fix.
This interview has absolutely been edited for length and clarity.
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The Playlist: What surprised you the most about Kate when you first got the scripts for the season?
Leslie Bibb: I think it’s the hardest thing about the show and also the greatest thing about the show, and I was saying this to Mike, is you’re so far from home, you can’t really commute. It’s not like I’m doing “Palm Royale” right now. I’m living in a hotel living at the Chateau Marmont, lucky me, and I go to Warner Brothers or I go to a location, but I come home to my house and I have a kitchen. I see my friend Shirley, and we go to the pool. We do water aerobics, and I go and have dinner with friends from New York. When you go to Thailand, that’s gone. You are immersed in the world of “The White Lotus.” You are very far from home, and you’re just untethered. And, for me at least, that creatively unlocked in a really deep way of just allowing everything I’m feeling is probably what Kate’s feeling. And somehow, I think it made the work better. I think even on a subliminal level, because we’re living in the hotels that we’re shooting in. And I think there was a relaxed freedom that I think came over me. The thing about Kate is that I go into these scenes with Carrie and Michelle, and stuff starts to happen. And we sort of shoot consecutively. And because we’re immersed in it and there’s no break, I’m just always in the world of Kate. Every morning, I would wake up with no distractions, no TV. So, I think I remember a big “aha” moment because in the script it’s written that Valentin, our butler, we’re all sort of like, “Ooh” with, and I was sitting in my chair, and I they were doing Michelle’s coverage and she was talking, and when she really directed the line to Laurie when she said, “Oh, he’s like a Russian porn star or something.” I was sitting in my little chair, perched there watching them. And I remember this thing happened. I got jealous. Kate got jealous, and I remember feeling that. And as I went home, I was like, “Oh, they’re going to ruin everything. He’s going to ruin my vacation, those boys.” And it became like an “aha” moment. So, every time Valentine comes to the table, I get annoyed with him coming to the table.
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That wasn’t written in the script.
No, I think by day three, we were shooting the boys coming back to the villa through the pool scene, and we hadn’t done the dance club yet. We did that the first week of shooting. So, there was a lot of stuff happening in real time as we were sort of being shot out of the cannon. The crew was getting used to each other. We were just like, “Holy f**k, we’re shooting ‘The White Lotus.’ Don’t f**k this up.” I’ve never done a show that’s like this level of beloved. Mike really gives an audience an elevated show and says, “I believe audiences are smart enough and they’ll get it.” And it’s like, I want to say to studios, “You can write bigger. You don’t have to force-feed them all this exposition. They remember what happened. They watch it, they go back.” So, by the time the boys came in, I think it was Wednesday or Thursday, I remembered that morning. I woke up and I went running into the costume designer, or I texted her and I said, “What am I wearing in this scene?” And she said, “Oh, you’re wearing a dress from the club?” And I went, “No, no, no, no, no, I have to wear pajamas.” And so I texted Mike and I said, “Nothing says, get the f**k out of my house, nothing is more passive aggressive than somebody saying, ‘Come back to my house,’ and then putting on their pajamas.” It’s just a subtle way to say, “Get out of my house.” So, Mike was like, “I love it.” So I went and I put on those pajamas and it was something that just sort of happened.

I don’t think I understood until I got into that scene, the triangle of it all. When it turns on me and I hear them talking about me, how heartbreaking it was to not be, to want their approval so badly. I remember Mike saying, “You could look at Kate and look at her as very slight, but if we do our job, they’ll see how deep it is.” Because of that, I was always trying to go, “She lives in Austin. She’s a rich woman. She’s this. All she wants is this perfection.” But why does somebody want perfection? Well, somebody wants perfection because they want control. Why do they want control? Because they’re scared. Why are they scared? Why is she scared that the Russians are going to ruin her vacation? Why is she scared that Laurie and Jaclyn won’t love her? Why is she scared? Because I don’t walk in and give them my political views or my views about church. I mean, everyone’s like, “Oh, that condescending smile you do.” I didn’t know I was doing what seems condescending. I mean, it seems very condescending, but it’s also to me a fear-based smile. It’s a smile that’s so tight, and are we going to ruin this vacation? Is her fear that who she used to be and who she is now will they not love her? I remember that I went back and I was looking at my scripts. They say, “Shut up Kate, f**k off Kate.” How much they really dismiss her. I said to Michelle, I was like, “How do you think this trip happened?” Because she was like, “Oh yeah, you for sure.” I was like, right. I’m the Julie McCoy* of the group.” I think it’s far more important for Kate to keep this trifecta together because I’m not quite sure if she loves all of her life choices.
*Julie McCoy was the cruise director on “The Love Boat.”

O.K., so let’s expand on that. When you talk about this smile, my interpretation was that the smile was her hiding. She doesn’t want to talk about this or that because she doesn’t want to hear the truth.
The thing is that these women, none of them, are without fault. None of them walk in and say, “I lost my job and I’m having trouble with my child and I’m getting a divorce.” “I married this guy who’s younger than me, and I don’t feel secure, and I’m an actress, and I don’t know how to do this,” and blah, blah, blah, blah. And then [Kate] moved to Austin, and my life seems perfect, but actually, I don’t feel really that happy. And I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have Dave and his money. I’ve never had a real job. What does my life look like? How do I make myself seem more important? And none of those women walk in and do that. They walk in and they have this idea of who they used to be, and all three of them are so scared to sort of be vulnerable. So, I think that smile is everything. I mean, I think it landed correctly. I wanted whatever the reaction to have happened, be. So it’s a loaded question. I mean, I’m sure many family members have had that conversation on either side. If you are a Democrat talking to a Republican or a Republican talking to a Democrat, your dismay with, “So is there an aisle or is there a fucking canyon between us?”
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So, they sent critics the first six episodes. And while I, like everyone else, was surprised by the big “sex” scene, the moment I really reacted to was when they talked about who Kate voted for. I had to tell my friends, “There’s Jaclyn, she’s LA, there’s Carrie, she’s New York.” And they’re looking at Austin and going, “Wait, what?” And it is so genius on so many levels because half of it is like “I knew it.” And then the other half is like, “Well, of course this is why we are the way we are, because we think this way.” Did you realize that scene would pop like that?
No. You know what my fear was? Also, Kate’s an independent, let’s just remember. But is she? I think it’s asking a woman how old she is, right? But it depends on the day sometimes. Depends on the day. My answer changes on Kate, whether she was voted for, because we filmed this…
Late last spring, right?
Last June, yeah, but I got those scripts in December.
This is about 2020.
Yeah, that was about 2020. So, I remember thinking, “Oh, is this going to feel dated?”
I wish.
It’s so funny. It’s so interesting. I said to Mike, “You’re like a soothsayer. You saw something.” So, honestly, when I read it, I was more concerned that it would feel dated because it was such a 2020 thing and not a 2024 thing. To me, it was not really about the politics so much as how everything feels so divisive. It’s like you are either team this or team that. And I feel like he picks something. And in that scene, that was like what you said, here’s LA, here’s New York, and here’s Austin. And I didn’t understand the power of that triangulation, how I didn’t understand how this storyline of these three women would feel so relatable. I underestimated that.
That’s what I was going to say, I feel like we see our friendships in these women, no matter what your gender.
Agreed.