The White Lotus has always used a luxury hotel as a stage on which wealthy guests perform their privilege. For its fourth season, Mike White has picked a hotel that already is one: the Hôtel Martinez on Cannes’ Promenade de la Croisette, a major VIP hub for celebrities and executives during the film festival. After skewering holidaymakers in Hawaii, Sicily and Thailand, the series is moving into the film industry’s own living room.

As Deadline’s Nada Aboul Kheir and Nellie Andreeva report, HBO’s mystery series has camped out at the Martinez as its lengthy shoot heads into the final stretch, and the hotel has been transformed. Sets in the lobby are blocked off with a sign that reads “This is a fragile movie set, please do not touch or move any set elements,” guarding golden palm trees, a fake elevator, a replica check-in desk, a circular sofa and two blue armchairs beneath a blue painting of a man. White Lotus caps, towels, bags and scarves are on display as well.

The most telling change is the logo, now visible everywhere from furniture to windows and carpets. Designed to match the Martinez’s art deco style, with a font that mimics the hotel’s real marquee, it is a major departure from the ornate flowers of earlier seasons. The emblem had been tweaked as the series moved from one location to the next, each version stealthily revealed in a start-of-production slate photo, Season 4’s included.

The new look fits the season’s subject. Speaking at Canneseries in April, executive producer David Bernad said White had wanted to make Season 4 about “the life of an artist – the loneliness and the pain,” a story that examines “how fame can be corrosive and dictate your choices in life.” The creators had eyed the French Riviera since Season 2, before settling on Italy. Two hotels anchor the new installment: the Martinez as the White Lotus Cannes and the Airelles Château de la Messardière in Saint-Tropez as the White Lotus du Cap, with Monaco also among the locations and some interiors shot in Paris.

The cast listed by Deadline includes Laura Dern, Steve Coogan, Vincent Cassel, Ben Kingsley, Kumail Nanjiani, Nadia Tereszkiewicz, Chris Messina and Max Greenfield. Helena Bonham Carter left the production early on, after it “had become apparent that the character which Mike White created for Helena Bonham Carter did not align once on set,” and the role was revamped and recast. White writes and directs the season and executive produces with Bernad and Mark Kamine.

Production began on the Riviera in April, and the show filmed scenes during the Cannes Film Festival in May. A weeklong shoot at the Martinez is rumored, and the hotel may have been booked out for the occasion. The season is due to premiere on HBO next year.

The hotel staff are already counting on the effect. A beaming doorman at the Martinez told Deadline that hosting The White Lotus will “surely get us more customers.”

Tags: HBO, The White Lotus, Cannes, Laura Dern, Mike White, Hôtel Martinez