There are so, so many takes about The White Lotus on the internet right now that I did have to ask myself if I should even bother writing about it at all. In case you haven’t watched it and aren’t on Twitter: the show, created entirely by Mike White, follows the events at The White Lotus Hawaiian resort over the course of six days. From the show’s first moments, we know that by the end of our stay, someone will be dead. The White Lotus is exploring a lot of ideas, and while there is plenty of debate about whether it can be a successful satire of white privilege and a condemnation of colonialism while also centering its white characters… that is not what I’m going to be talking about in this blog post. No, I’m here to talk about Armond.
(Spoilers for The White Lotus to follow.)
Something I love about this show is that while it’s often funny, it features a strong through-line of underlying dread, and no character better exemplifies its overall tone than Armond, played by Murray Bartlett. The White Lotus has no true heroes, mostly villains of varying degrees, and if this show had a spectrum from hero to villain (it doesn’t, that’s what makes it good, but go with me just for this), Armond would fall right in the center. He is basically playing out his own private version of Uncut Gems, continuously raising the stakes and digging himself deeper and deeper into a hole. He is at times extremely selfish, and his workplace behavior problematic to say the least—but he’s also charming, funny, and sympathetic in his desperation. This is such a complex and interesting character, buoyed by Barlett’s pitch-perfect performance, and every time he showed up on screen I had absolutely no idea what he was going to do next.
So, here are five things Armond did that made me say—whether in horror or in delight—“what the fuck?”
LET’S FUCKING GO
5.) Lying about double-booking the pineapple suite
This moment, right near the start of episode one, was when I knew we were in for a ride with Armond. The lies re: the pineapple suite escalate dramatically from here, but this is where it all begins. At first I figured there was actually some kind of glitch, that Shane (Jake Lacy) was just being entitled and had probably done something wrong in his booking, but when he walks away, Armond immediately admits to another hotel staffer that this was his mistake. He’s like, “oops, I fucked up and double booked the pineapple sweet, lol!” The way he automatically lied to Shane like that, like it was second nature to him to just make that shit up without a moment’s hesitation, set the tone for Armond’s chaotic energy throughout the season.
4.) Sending Shane and Rachel on Tanya’s memorial boat
As I mentioned before, the pineapple suite situation escalates in a number of ways, but I think this was probably the second most unhinged thing Armond does to Shane (more on number one later). Knowing what he knows about Tanya (Jennifer Coolidge) and her plans for this boat ride, then positioning it as a special treat for Shane and Rachel (Alexandra Daddario) as an apology for the mix-up with the suite—this is a level of pettiness that I can only aspire to.
It’s another plan that Armond comes up with completely off-the-cuff, and is also a clear example of the way his brain works: he is constantly coming up with temporary solutions without considering their long-term effects. Does he think about the fact that Shane will absolutely realize that Armond did this on purpose, and that it’s only going to make Shane feel even more angry and more entitled? No! Armond is only thinking about how hilarious it’s going to be when Shane and Rachel are trying to have a romantic dinner set to the sweet sounds of Tanya drunkenly weeping over the sea, and how maybe some of her mother’s ashes will fly back into their food.
Absolutely zero foresight. We have to stan.
3.) Coming on to Mark at the bar
I have to say that this scene featured my favorite line of the season, purely because of Murray Barlett’s delivery. Armond, binge-drinking at the bar, is approached by an equally drunk Mark (Steve Zahn), who is questioning his entire reality after finding out that his father was gay. Mark decides he’s going to deal with this by finding the one person at the resort he’s pretty sure is gay and then asking some extremely inappropriate questions, ie: “you’re gay, right?” Finally, Mark asks what he for some reason really wants to know, which is what it feels like to have anal sex. Armond looks at him for a long couple of seconds, raises his eyebrows a little, smiles, and asks, “Do you wanna find out?”
Reader, when I tell you I screamed.
2.) Rimming his hotel staffer in his office
Before I get into this, I do want to note that the way Armond abuses what little power he has is not something I condone or want to celebrate. His behavior towards Dillon (Lukas Gage) more than constitutes a workplace sexual harassment claim. That said, the climax (lol) of episode four is truly iconic. There has been a lot of debate on Twitter about the act of rimming itself and whether the way it was depicted here is what We The People deserve, but I am calling out this moment more for the pure audacity of Armond’s decision to do this in his OFFICE with the door UNLOCKED. Workplace sex scenes are usually hurried and at least partially-clothed, so the fact that these two men were one hundred percent naked and fully fucking on the desk—even under the influence of drugs—was absolutely wild. It was like neither of them could imagine a universe in which they might get caught.
Also, hey, whatever your feelings are about the way this was filmed, we don’t get a lot of rimming representation on television, so like… I can’t be too picky, you know?
1.) Taking a shit in Shane’s suitcase
Speaking of representation on television, I can say with confidence that I have never seen anything like this on TV in my near 30 years of existence. When it happened, my roommate and I were watching together, and as soon as we realized what Armond was doing we were like, “oh my god,” but then he squatted and we got a profile shot and then we realized that we were going to SEE it, at which point we were like, “OH. MY GOD.” This is the WTF moment to end all WTF moments. Poop leaving the body. On screen. I’ll never forget this. On my deathbed, when my life is flashing before my eyes, this moment will feature heavily.
There is no better final moment for Armond, who at this point knows he’s probably going to be fired thanks to Shane’s complaints (and, let’s be real, his own questionable decision-making skills). I love this ending for him, an appropriately unhinged culmination of the game of cat and mouse he and Shane have been playing all along. Sure, Armond may technically lose in the end, but in my mind, he wins.