The White Lotus creator Mike White has responded to the show’s former composer Cristóbal Tapia de Veer quitting the show and going public with their “fight” over creative differences.
Last week, just days ahead of the divisive The White Lotus season three finale, Tapia de Veer revealed to The New York Times that he would not be returning for the show’s fourth season.
Despite winning three Emmy Awards for his work on the show’s viral theme songs, Tapia de Veer said that there was “tension” between him and White over their creative differences.
Most notably, the music creator said that he and White didn’t agree on White wanting to strip the “ooh-loo-loo-loo” sound from the season three theme, considering it had made the theme songs from the first two seasons so successful.
Tapia de Veer said he wanted to share the original song online, complete with “ooh-loo-loo-loos”, as fans of the show were unhappy with the season three song.
“…Mike cut that – he wasn’t happy about that,” Tapia de Veer said. “I mean, at that point, we already had our last fight forever, I think. So he was just saying no to anything. So I just uploaded that to my YouTube.”
Now, speaking to Howard Stern on The Howard Stern Show, White has responded to the composer’s decision to air their dirty laundry with The New York Times, calling it a “b**ch move”.
“I honestly don’t know what happened, except now I’m reading his interview because he decided to do a PR campaign about him leaving the show. I just don’t think he respected me. He wants people to know that he’s edgy and dark and I’m, I don’t know, like I watch reality TV,” White said.
“We never really even fought. He says we feuded. I don’t think I ever had a fight with him – except for maybe some emails. I knew he wasn’t a team player and that he wanted to do it his way, or whatever.”
He added: “I was thrown that he would go to The New York Times to s**t on me and the show three days before the finale. It was kind of a b**ch move.”
Mike White said that after Tapia de Veer won the Emmy Awards for his work on the show, the composer “did not want to go through the process” of getting notes from White on his work.
“He always had this like contemptuous smirk on his face whenever he was dealing with me because I just think he thought I was a chimp or something, I don’t know.”
White went on to describe the music producer as “talented”, while Tapia de Veer himself said that he was still “pretty proud” of his time on the black comedy show.
“I mean, it is what it is,” the latter said. “There’s one thing I’m pretty proud of and that is I feel like I never gave up. Maybe I was being unprofessional, and for sure Mike feels that I was always unprofessional to him because I didn’t give him what he wanted. But what I gave him did this, you know – did those Emmys, people going crazy.”
Elsewhere in his chat with Stern, White said that he would begin writing The White Lotus season four this summer, after a break. While he wouldn’t reveal the location of the fourth season, he did suggest that it wouldn’t be taking place in South America.
The White Lotus season three came to a close on Sunday (6 April) with a fairly controversial finale, featuring the death of a fan-favourite character.
The show is streaming on HBO in the US, and NOW in the UK.
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