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Topics: Entertainment, HBO, TV
Ilana Frost
Mike White’s lore should be studied because explain to me how TF The White Lotus show creator is the same man who wrote School of Rock and played Ned Schneebly… and he almost won a season of Survivor? I aspire to have like five percent of this king’s ambition and multi-talentedness. If you’re a fan of Survivor and The White Lotus, you’ve probably recognized several Survivor stars showing up in White Lotus episodes. In season 1, Mike’s original Goliath tribemate, Alec Merlino, played a party boy bartender named Hutch. We also got to see Survivor queens Angelina Keeley and Kara Kay in season 2 when they played rich besties on vaca in Sicily. And you guessed it — there are more exciting cameos in the new season too.
Did you notice these Survivor cameos in The White Lotus season 3?
Natalie made a White Lotus season 3 premiere cameo as a hotel guest at dinner. But before she was invited to join the show, she and Mike had beef to squash from their Survivor days. “Initially, he thought he was never going to speak to me again!” Natalie told Entertainment Weekly. When they competed on the CBS reality show together, she apparently “feuded” with Mike’s bestie, Jeremy Crawford, so Mike wasn’t her biggest fan. (He voted her off the show.)
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“The fact that he could look beyond the way he felt about me in Fiji and ask me to come do a part speaks volumes about him as a person,” Natalie reflected to EW. Ultimately, they were able to make up, and they stayed in touch over the years. When Mike brought up the idea of Natalie doing a cameo in season 3, she didn’t think he was serious. But sure enough, she eventually got that text.
Natalie did have some hesitations after seeing season 2. She recalled responding: “‘Well, wait a minute, Mike. It was kind of raunchy in season 2.’ I was concerned about it being so graphic with sex organs and all of that.” Mike assured her that this season was focused on death and not sex… so much more light and wholesome!
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After Mike invited Natalie to join season 3, he then “looped Carl in” and decided he was going to play Natalie’s husband, she shared. “I said, ‘Okay, so there’s going to be some humor to this,” Natalie told EW. When Belinda (Natasha Rothwell) sees their characters sitting at the hotel restaurant, she takes notice and laters tells her son that there were “two Black people … and they weren’t staff!”
Carl shared the exciting news in a February 2024 Instagram post. “Ok it’s not a secret anymore,” the Survivor alum wrote alongside a screenshot of a rumor about his cameo. “Yes I will be appearing on The White Lotus another venture in this beautiful thing we call life.”
Natalie said she encouraged Carl to “speak up” more because Mike told them they could improvise. “I was trying to help Carl but he’s laid back and he continued to be,” she shared.
Look out for Carl and Natalie on season 3 of The White Lotus!