The White Lotus’ eerie, occasionally discordant music is one of the show’s defining qualities, but composer Cristóbal Tapia de Veer has played his last tune for the HBO drama series.
In a new interview with The New York Times, Tapia de Veer revealed he has left the show due to a creative dispute with creator and showrunner Mike White. It started with disagreements over the show’s theme song, which has transformed throughout all three seasons. Originally, White was looking for a theme that was closer to “background music … a song that is more like something you would listen to in Ibiza, in some clubby place with a chill, sexy vibe” from Tapia de Veer. While Tapia de Veer eventually convinced the production team to allow the theme to be a bit weirder, White still wasn’t satisfied when beginning work on Season 3; apparently, the vocal “ooh-loo-loo-loo” motif from the first two seasons’ themes was purposely cut by White.
The composer was confused, thinking that the recognizable motif would satisfy fans: “I texted the producer and I told him that it would be great to, at some point, give them the longer version with the ‘ooh-loo-loo-loos,’ because people will explode if they realize that it was going there anyway… I don’t think everybody was really aware of how attached people were to the ‘ooh-loo-loo-loos,’” Tapia de Veer said. “He thought it was a good idea. But then Mike cut that — he wasn’t happy about that.”
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The theme quarrel turned out to be the final straw for Tapia de Veer, who uploaded his full Season 3 theme composition to YouTube in response. “At that point, we already had our last fight forever, I think. So he was just saying no to anything,” Tapia de Veer said. He compared his experience working with White to be that of a “rock band”: “I was like, ‘Okay, this is like a rock band I’ve been in before where the guitar player doesn’t understand the singer at all.’”
He also compared the dynamic to the film La Cage Aux Folles: “There’s Albin, which is like the star, and there’s Renato, who is the producer who is always taking care that Albin doesn’t lose his mind about something, because Albin is the diva and Renato is the guy who is trying to make everything work,” Tapia de Veer said. “To me, the show felt very much like that.”
Tapia de Veer confirmed that he’s “for sure” left the program, and initially departed without telling White. “I didn’t tell Mike for various reasons; I wanted to tell him just at the end for the shock and whatever. Except I told the whole editorial team and music editor and producer and all that, but I didn’t think that they were going to tell him. At some point he heard about that,” he said.
The White Lotus will close out its Thailand-set Season 3 on Sunday night with a 90-minute finale. Revisit our list of White Lotus Season 3 characters who we hope will survive the finale — and who we hope gets their comeuppance.
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