Mike White revealed during the Survivor 50 finale on Wednesday night that his fellow players, Charlie Davis and Kamilla Karthigesu, will be featured on the fourth season of The White Lotus.
The Emmy Award winner called into the live finale episode as he’s currently in France shooting for the upcoming installment. While speaking with Jeff Probst, the host asked if season four would encompass any Survivor cameos and if he’d be able to reveal exactly which players were joining the scripted series.
“Everybody’s invited, but there are gonna be two contestants that we’re flying out to be in the show, and they are Charlie and Kamilla,” White said.
White has famously featured former Survivor players from his first season in every installment of the beloved HBO drama. He originally appeared on the show’s 37th season that aired in 2018, which was entitled David vs. Goliath (he was labeled a “Goliath” thanks to his profession as a filmmaker).
Season one of The White Lotus featured Alec Merlino in not just a cameo role, but the recurring role of Hutch, a waiter and bartender at the hotel. Angelina Keeley (who White also competed against on Survivor 50) and Kara Kay popped up in season two, while Natalie Cole and Carl Boudreaux appeared in season three.
Davis nearly won the 46th installment of Survivor in 2024, finishing second; Karthigesu finished in fourth on Survivor‘s 48th season.
Both Davis and Karthigesu join an already star-studded slate that White has assembled for The White Lotus season four. They’ll be joined by the likes of Laura Dern, Kumail Nanjiani, Rosie Perez, Steve Coogan, Sandra Bernhard, Laura Smet and many more.
White placed second on his original Survivor season, though he suffered an early blindside on season 50. The topic of the director’s infamous cameos on The White Lotus actually came up in the reality competition series, which White unpacked in his exit interview with The Hollywood Reporter.
He addressed Christian Hubicki’s claims that Ozzy Lusth was vying for a brief spot on the Emmy Award-winning show, noting, “The idea that Ozzy just wanted to keep me around because he wanted a White Lotus cameo, I don’t think that was accurate.”
White also said that the attention around his Survivor return could have led to him being an easy target to vote out of the game.
“The fact that The White Lotus and the cameos, and there’s a lot of press before where people asked about it… it just became this whole thing out there that I couldn’t control,” he said. “It was, in some ways, maybe helpful with somebody, but I don’t think anybody goes out to Survivor to throw their game for a cameo in White Lotus.”
More to come.
