It must have been like manna from heaven when, in October 2020, HBO decided to locate its new hit drama, The White Lotus, at the Four Seasons on Maui, Hawaii. The luxury resort had been closed since the islands locked down in late March, but this meant suites could be reopened for filming and furloughed staff brought back to work.
Now it’s the turn of another Four Seasons hotel, the San Domenico Palace in Taormina, Sicily, to be the star turn for the second series, which airs from October 31 on HBO/Sky Atlantic. Though lockdown is now just a memory for Italy, the choice of one of Sicily’s most beautiful towns (and certainly its glitziest) was welcomed by a country hit hard – and early – by the pandemic. The arrival of the international cast and crew in February was forecast to mean a €2m boost to the town’s hotels, rental flats, bars and restaurants, along with work opportunities for local people, including roles as extras. And the benefits are expected to continue.
“These have been intense months,” said Gabriele Zuccaro, owner of Ristorante Badia in the town centre, “but [director] Mike White’s team has showed off all the loveliest parts of Taormina. For our town it is extraordinary worldwide publicity.”
But will the bling of Hawaii translate to the luccichio of Taormina? The design team for the first season found the Four Seasons Resort Maui too bland for filming, and added brighter soft furnishings, flowers and plants, to make a hotel that was “kitschy and flawed and rich, like the characters”. In the way of luxury hotels the world over, the San Domenico Palace is similarly muted – white linens and sandy neutrals – so may have received the same treatment, though the flashy marble bathroom of its most expensive suite (about €5,000 a night) features prominently in the season-two trailer.
Visitor numbers to Maui in the first half of 2022 recovered to within a whisker of pre-pandemic levels, with spending up by more than 16%. The hotel’s general manager, Ben Shank, told journalists the phone had been ringing nonstop since the show aired. “It’s taken on a life of its own. You couldn’t imagine the amount of calls we’ve gotten.”
In Sicily, the San Domenico Palace, a former monastery overlooking the sea, has similarly reported being “booked to April 2023”, but now, in shoulder season, with pleasant temperatures in the low 20s, there is plenty of availability for those happy to pay Four Seasons-level prices (doubles this weekend from €1,050, including an “exceptional” breakfast).
Despite Maui’s Four Seasons oozing luxury, director Mike White found it dispiriting: “You go to these places where you’re supposed to be escaping from all of the problems of the world, and you realise you can’t really escape them,” he told the Los Angeles Times. “The sense of unease you feel is almost amplified in places where you’re supposed to feel so relaxed.”
You don’t need to be in a billionaire bolthole to enjoy Taormina’s beauty – though the generous sprinkling of super-rich visitors does mean the people-watching on Piazza IX Aprile is just as fascinating as the ancient Greek theatre and the volcano views.
Nor do you need to be a billionaire. For about a tenth of the cost of the San Domenico Palace, visitors can stay at another former monastery, the Splendid Hotel (doubles from €115, B&B), half a mile away. It has a pool and restaurant, and is handy for the cable car down to Mazzarò beach. And if valet parking à la San Domenico is important, you can have this too, for €15 a day.
The first season of White Lotus was praised for showing the malign influence of the wealthy visitors on local people, but also for treating Hawaii as a character in itself, rather than as a backdrop. The new location also has much to offer: from the towering bulk of Etna to ancient Syracuse further south, eastern Sicily is as well supplied with wonders as Four Seasons guests are with Gucci luggage.
