The White Lotus' Aimee Lou Wood Reacts to "Mean" SNL Parody
Aimee Lou Wood was not amused by SNL's White Lotus parody.
The April 12 episode of the NBC series featured a political sketch titled The White POTUS, which saw cast member Sarah Sherman spoofing the British actress' character Chelsea, complete with what appeared to be a dental prosthetic and similar outfit to one she sported on the HBO Max show.
Wood, who has spoken before about bullied over her teeth, wrote on her Instagram Stories April 13, "I did find the SNL thing mean and unfunny xo."
Several fans DMed her to express support. "I agree — everyone else in that parody was a political figure who was being mocked," one person wrote in a message the actress shared. "The only character who wasn't political was Chelsea, and they were clearly taking the p--s out of your appearance/accent."
Wood, who is from Manchester, England, wrote in another post, "At least get the accent right seriously. I respect accuracy even if it's mean."
The 31-year-old also said "Yes, take the p--s for sure - that's what the show is about but there must be a cleverer, more nuanced, less cheap way?"
The actress later shared an update, writing, "I've had apologies from SNL."
Sherman appeared in the sketch with several SNL costars, including James Austin Johnson, who reprised his recurring role of President Donald Trump. The episode's celebrity host Jon Hamm parodied both Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Chelsea's partner Rick—Walton Goggins' character on The White Lotus' recent third season.
"I have these insane ideas, like, what if we took all the fluoride out of the drinking water?" Hamm's RFK Jr. character tells Sherman's. "But what would that do to people's teeth?"
The SNL actress responds, "Fluoride? What's that?"
"A big thing for me growing up was my mouth,” Aimee shared in a March 3 video on her Instagram, “because it was the thing that everyone pointed out, and it was the thing that made me different."
Weeks later, the Sex Education alum spoke again about the public scrutiny over her mouth. "I can’t believe the impact my teeth are having," she said during a March 22 appearance on the U.K. talk series The Jonathan Ross Show. “Because the Americans can’t believe—but they’re all being lovely.”
She noted that orthodontists have shared videos analyzing her bite.
“They dissect my teeth and say what’s wrong with it,” she explained. "But at the end go, ‘But we don’t think she should change a thing.' Oh my God, it feels so lovely. A real full-circle moment after being bullied for my teeth forever.”
After the crowd laughed, she added, “Now people are clapping in an audience ‘cause I’ve got these gnashers.”
Read on for everything we know so far about the upcoming fourth season of The White Lotus...
HBO officially renewed The White Lotus for a fourth season in January, weeks before the third season premiered and after series creator Mike White pitched ideas for another go-round of moneyed murder and mayhem.
"Mike, obviously—if he wants to move forward and do the four seasons—he will do the fourth season," HBO CEO Casey Bloys told reporters in November.
Production on season four will likely kick off in 2026, according to Variety.
The million-dollar question. White and fellow producers haven't yet revealed their season four destination, but they've been dropping hints.
"We're going on some locations scouting in the next couple of weeks, so we'll know soon," executive vice president of HBO Programming Francesca Orsi told Deadline in February. "I can’t really say where we’re going to land but chances are somewhere in Europe."
Chances, she emphasized.
There are "some countries on the map that we talked about," Orsi added, "but nothing to report on until they actually go locations scouting."
White said in an interview for HBO that ran after the April 6 season three finale that he was looking to "get a little bit out of the 'crashing waves against rocks' vernacular" for next season.
"But," he added, "there's always room for more murders at the White Lotus hotels."
White also mentioned Australia as a dream destination while he was in Sydney at the Vivid Festival in June 2023.
“It would be so fun," he said. "Obviously, there’s a huge wealth of talent here and the beauty is inarguable, so it feels like it checks all the boxes.”
Really, the possibilities are endless, almost: A body in the snow has yet to be a plot point on the series, but a fancy ski resort may not be in the cards. Producer David Bernad told The Guardian in February, "Mike doesn't like the cold."
Cristóbal Tapia de Veer, the Emmy-winning composer behind the White Lotus title themes, will not be back for season four, citing creative disagreements with White dating back to the show's first season.
"It's kind of weird right now because I announced to the team a few months ago that I was not coming back, that I was leaving," Tapia de Veer told the New York Times in an interview published April 2. "I didn’t tell Mike for various reasons; I wanted to tell him just at the end for the shock and whatever." (White did find out before season's end, he said.)
As for the instantly catchy theme music he wrote for season one (that also opened season two), "You see it afterward, and it’s a success," Tapia de Veer said, "but to get there is quite the struggle" because White "didn't want the theme."
And no one told him to retool the opener for season three, he said, but he did—much to fans' loud consternation.
"When that came out, I had TMZ calling me, even people from England and from France, because they wanted some kind of statement about the theme," Tapia de Veer said. "People are furious about the change of the theme, and I thought that was interesting. I texted the producer and I told him that it would be great to, at some point, give them the longer version with the ooh-loo-loo-loos, because people will explode if they realize that it was going there anyway. He thought it was a good idea. But then Mike cut that—he wasn’t happy about that."
The composer added, "I mean, at that point, we already had our last fight forever, I think. So he was just saying no to anything."
On The Howard Stern Show April 8, White called it a "b--ch" move" for Tapia de Veer to air his grievances like that.
"I honestly don't know what happened," White said, "except now I'm reading his interviews because he decides to do some PR campaign about him leaving the show. I just don't think he respected me."
They "never really even fought," the producer continued. "He says we feuded...It was basically me giving him notes."
Their collaboration "did work" during the first two seasons, White said, because they shared ideas. By season three, Tapia de Veer "didn't want to go through the process with me, he didn't want to get notes from me, he didn't want to go to sessions."
And, White added, "He's definitely making a big deal out of just a creative difference."
White was pleasantly shocked that Jon Gries, who played Tanya's mysterious suitor Greg in season one and her calculating husband in season two, agreed to come back to play nefarious widower Gary in season three. But Gries said Gary's (a.k.a. Greg's) ship has sailed, as far as he knows.
However, that's what he thought last time.
"I don’t think [I'm coming back], but I don’t know so," he told The Hollywood Reporter after season three ended with Gary's secret safe for now. "All I can say is, every time I leave, I assume it’s over."
And yet despite the appeal of having all new guests at each resort—"I can burn down the house at the end of every season," White told The New Yorker, "and start building again”—the show has proved that, if you aren't dead...
"There’s no trying to predict anything Mike White does," Gries admitted to THR. "I never presumed I’d be in season two. Same for season three. Everything he does has an element of surprise to it. Yes, I would love to come back. But does the book on Greg seem like it’s complete? I can’t tell you."
Short of a White Lotus prequel or multiverse situation, there's really no vehicle for Jennifer Coolidge's Tanya to return except in a flashback or dream sequence. But the hope has remained ever since her unfortunate tumble from a yacht in the season two finale that revealed her to be the premiere's mystery body after being the only returning character from season one.
White has admitted to missing Coolidge's presence, but hasn't questioned his decision to kill off the well-intentioned but gullible and obscenely wealthy Tanya.
"He sort of sticks to his guns," Coolidge said of White on E! News in January 2023 after the season two finale. "He's an amazing friend, but I think he made his decision. He wanted a big, dramatic, Italian, you know, operatic ending for White Lotus 2, and he wanted to sacrifice Tanya."
Confirming she definitely wouldn't be showing up in Thailand for season three, she told The New Yorker, "I don't think Tanya's ever coming back, so I have to live with it."
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