How ‘The White Lotus’ Nails the Ugly Truth About Female Friendship

Except it’s not the Real Housewives, and if anything, the dynamic we’re seeing play out on The White Lotus is more grounded in reality than anything we’ve seen on reality TV. Take these exchanges, for instance:

“Look at you, your kids are gorgeous, your home is beautiful, you’re totally winning at life.”

“Who’s your doctor? Shut up!”

“Your daughter seems like she’s turning into a really cool girl.”

They’re not saying anything for shock value, and there’s nothing inherently wrong with these statements. But having always been fascinated by friendships among women both growing up in the Midwest and now in Los Angeles, it’s the kind that makes me frankly want to vomit. As a teen in St. Louis, I watched as all the popular girls iced me out (actually, they never welcomed me at all) because I was that academic kid with three learning disabilities who could carry on conversations with adults better than my own peers. And now, as a longtime editor at Glamour who covers Hollywood, I’ve seen my fair share of actresses, influencers, and producers who converse as if they’ve never had a real conversation in their lives. (Of course, I’ve also seen the opposite; those that truly understand what makes for a deep friendship, and what it actually means when women support each other, whether in the Midwest or the West Coast.)

But what Mike White so expertly does with this trio of women is showcase just how sad those superficial relationships are. Truth be told, I don’t even think Kate, Laurie and Jaclyn would consider their friendship ‘fake;’ they just don’t know how to be anything but.

“I’m very fascinated by female relationships,” Bibb says during our sit-down interview. “What resonated with me, because of the way I grew up, was the idea of being perfect and bright and shiny, and thinking that if I can control everything, I can make it fit into this and [be] the perfect this and the perfect wife. I had this idea that I could somehow ease any pain, which is a joke. You can’t do that in life.”