After Last Night’s Shocking "The White Lotus" Episode, The Actors Defended The Incest Storyline

If you’re caught up with this season of The White Lotus, then you already know all about the absolutely wild incest storyline that finally came to a head during last night’s episode.

To keep this brief as possible: Throughout the season, a very certain kind of tension has been building between brothers Lochlan Ratliff (Sam Nivola) and Saxon Ratliff (Patrick Schwarzenegger) — and during a highly intoxicated sexual encounter with Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood) and Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon) in last week’s episode “Full-Moon Party,” the two seemingly engaged in some incestuous behavior that was confirmed in the falling action of last night’s installment, “Denials.”

The whole thing is undoubtedly one of the most shocking TV moments of the young year so far — and in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, Patrick and Sam spilled on their thoughts regarding the entire situation.

“There’s some sensationalism, but then there’s also the stuff behind the wall of the character and what he’s dealing with in the conflict of what just happened,” Patrick said while discussing the events that take place during “Denials.” “What is that going to do to who he thinks he is? His thoughts on, what is it like to be a man? What is a man? What makes all these different things that he thought he stood for in the episode and the days before?”

“[The White Lotus creator Mike White] does a great job with my character with that scene, but also in past seasons of always bringing something that is really fun and outrageous and sparks a conversation that gets people talking, but also has to do a lot with the pilgrimage of the characters’ story and where he’s going. And here, especially with the relationship Saxon has with his little brother. There’s always more than what just meets the eye of the shock value on the screen.”

Speaking to the act of filming the intimate scenes, Sam said, “It’s kind of impossible for it to not be charged when you’re literally naked with all these cameras in front of you.” But as he continued to detail, both Sam and Patrick felt like they were in good hands.

“We really trusted Mike, because there’s always a very shocking, crazy, intense moment in every season. It’s never just for the sake of being shocking, it always serves the story. And that [incest] scene is really the inciting incident for where our relationship goes next. It’s a great storytelling tactic. Going into this, we really trusted Mike because he’s a fucking badass and a genius.”