The White Lotus Effect

Viewers of popular shows are "set-jetting" to the locales where they filmed.

- By Kayla Webley Adler

There's one request that Lorenzo Maraviglia, the general manager of San Domenico Palace, a Four Seasons Hotel in Taormina, hears from guests more than any other: How can we re-create Jennifer Coolidge's fantasy Vespa ride along the Sicilian coast? (Which was itself inspired by the 1960 film L'Avventura.)

Since the October 2022 premiere of the second season of HBO's wildly popular series The White Lotus, which was filmed at the San Domenico Palace, Maraviglia says that reservation requests have "literally never stopped." When he saw the picturesque 14th-century convent-turned-resort onscreen, he was struck by how authentically the property was showcased: "The garden, the pool, the piano man in the bar are all just as they are. Even the uniforms are our uniforms—it cannot be more realistic than that," Maraviglia says. "The guests tell us, 'It really feels like you're part of the show, because they haven't changed anything."

Opposite: The view of the Gulf of Thailand from the Four Seasons Resort Koh Samui.

Above: A scene from Season 3, featuring (from left) Jason Isaacs, Parker Posey, Patrick Schwarzenegger, Sarah Catherine Hook, and Sam Nivola.