There’s plenty to unpack in the unfolding of “The White Lotus” season three: the tension between trio of friends Jaclyn, Kate, and Laurie, the Ratliff family’s impending financial ruin, the diabolical return of Greg (Gary?) partying on Tanya’s yacht. Like seasons past, there are also penises galore.
Set in a tropical seaside resort by the same name in Koh Samui, it’s the perfect backdrop for baring all — and bare all, Timothy Ratcliff (played by Jason Isaacs) did. In a now-viral moment four episodes in, the world watched while a stressed-out con dad let his proverbial snake slither outside his robe. The full-frontal nudity left plenty of people wondering: are any TV penises real, or the makings of some prosthetic magic?
Turns out, at least in this case, it’s the latter. According to Timothy’s on-screen children Lochlan and Piper, played by Sam Nivola and Sarah Catherine Hook, Isaacs “took pride in the prosthetic,” she told TV Insider. “He [was] like, ‘It’s my fake dick scene today!'” Nivola added.
In a separate interview, Isaacs told Decider the move was an intentional choice by director Mike White to tip the scales of who you see naked on screen. “Look, [White] is trying to right the balance of how many naked women I’ve seen growing up on every television show and film.”
A refreshing change of pace, indeed — and probably why it’s not the first (or last, probably) time the team at “The White Lotus” has created a prosthetic penis for the cast. In fact, in an interview with Jimmy Fallon, actor Theo James (who played Cameron in season two) confirmed that he too was wearing one during his naked scene — an aesthetic choice by White that he then discussed at length with the show’s key makeup artist Rebecca Hickey. “I said, ‘Honestly, I just want it not to be distracting.'” Then, “we get to set and she’s got, like, a hammer or something,” says James. “It’s bigger than that. It’s like she stole it off a donkey in the field. The thing is ginormous. It was nine inches flat and about four inches wide. We were like, ‘What the hell is that?'” (For what it’s worth, the average penis size clocks in at 5.16 inches.)
Optics aside, the decision to create a prosthetic part for nude scenes is hardly uncommon, or new. Jason Collins, a prosthetics and special effects makeup designer, has created the penises for shows “Pam & Tommy” and “Euphoria,” and previously told PS that the process takes weeks of meticulous planning, hours of application, and sometimes dozens of silicone pieces.
“Nothing’s reusable because the edges are so delicate on these things, and that’s what gives them their seamless transition from the skin to the appliance,” Collins says. “When that edge is disrupted or disturbed is when the audience can tell that they’re wearing something. Once we remove those daily, we have to have a new piece for the next day.”
Similarly to creating a facial prosthetic, the process of creating a fake penis goes as such: cast, mold, and color down each silicone application. “They’re all cast in the exact same mold, same color,” he says. “Once we get the recipe down, the plasticity of the silicone appliances, we just keep casting them every day.” (It’s worth noting that, according to Allure, actors do not get their actual genitalia cast. While prosthetic teams will create a three-dimensional copy of the groin and leg area, this is done so the piece fits the person — not to reflect their real-life anatomy.)
Whether that’s what you signed up to see every Sunday, no matter. As Bert Di Grasso so eloquently put it: “I mean, it’s a penis — not a sunset.”
