‘The White Lotus: Sicily’ Season 2: Aubrey Plaza Reveals Mike White Wrote the Character For Her — ‘It Felt Very Naked’
The highly anticipated The White Lotus: Sicily Season 2 finally hits HBO with Aubrey Plaza on Oct. 30. The first season stole the 2022 Emmys, taking home 10 Academy Awards, with back-to-back wins for creator and director Mike White. He’s poised to do it again with season 2 and a brand new star-studded cast. White is strategic when he writes his characters, like in season 1 when he created Tanya McQuoid for Jennifer Coolidge. Now, he’s written a character specifically for Aubrey Plaza — and it’s so spot on that the actor “felt very naked,” when she began acting out the role.
Who is Aubrey Plaza’s character in ‘The White Lotus: Sicily’?
Aubrey Plaza portrays Harper Spiller in The White Lotus: Sicily Season 2. She’s vacationing with her husband, Ethan (Will Sharpe), his college roommate, Cameron (Theo James), and the roommate’s wife, Daphne (Meghann Fahy).
“Newly wealthy after her husband finds professional success,” the HBO character synopsis reads about Harper.
In The White Lotus: Sicily trailer, Cameron asks his wife if Ethan “regrets marrying such a dud” now that he’s rich. Meanwhile, Harper tells Ethan she suspects “there’s a reason they invited us here.”
Harper worries that the only reason Cameron wants to hang out with Ethan is that he’s suddenly wealthy. She rolls her eyes and gives off vibes that she cannot stand Cameron and Daphne.
Mike White wrote Aubrey Plaza’s character specifically for her in ‘The White Lotus: Sicily’
Like Jennifer Coolidge in The White Lotus Season 1, White created the character of Harper Spiller because he knows Aubrey Plaza so well.
“Without going into personal details, Mike knows me very, very well, on a way more intimate level than most people know me, and a lot of what he wrote was informed by just knowing me on that intimate level,” she told Entertainment Weekly. “It was really intense for me, reading it and shooting it. I relate to this character more than any character I’ve ever played. It’s really, really close to home. It felt very naked. It was pretty devastating and hard.”
Plaza felt so naked that she had difficulty not letting her character bleed into her personal life while filming.
“Mike’s writing is just so subtle but there’s such a deep truth to it that just crushes me,” she added. “I wanted so badly to do a good job, and Harper’s journey, there’s a lot of moments in this season that felt very nightmare-ish to me. It just felt real, and shaking that off was a big obstacle for me. I don’t regret it because I wanted to give Mike everything, no matter what happened. But I’ll be terrified and horrified to see it.”
What other roles did Aubrey Plaza portray before ‘The White Lotus’?
Aubrey Plaza is one of the more recognizable characters in The White Lotus: Sicily because she had a prominent role in the NBC sitcom Parks and Recreation. Plaza portrayed April Ludgate from 2009 to 2015, throughout seven seasons, and returned for the special on April 30, 2020.
The 38-year-old actor, comedian, and producer also appeared in numerous films, including Safety Not Guaranteed (2012), Mystery Team (2009), Scott Pilgrim vs. the World (2010), Monsters University (2013), Life After Beth (2014), Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates (2016), The Little Hours (2017), Happiest Season (2020), and Emily the Criminal (2022).
The White Lotus: Sicily premieres on HBO on Oct. 30, 2022, with the first episode. Subsequent episodes drop to HBO weekly.
