‘White Lotus’ Composer Says He Won’t Be Back for Season 4 Due to Tension With Mike White

“The White Lotus” may have already won three Emmy Awards for its iconic music and score — and that’s before the current third season has even become eligible — but composer Cristóbal Tapia de Veer just revealed that he will not be checking back in for Season 4.

In fact, the theme song musician said he shared the news of his exit with the team behind the HBO anthology series months ago and his decision apparently all has to do with creative differences with creator Mike White: “We already had our last fight forever.”

“I feel like this was, you know, a rock ‘n’ roll band story,” Tapia de Veer told The New York Times in an interview out Wednesday. “This is like a rock band I’ve been in before where the guitar player doesn’t understand the singer at all.”

“It’s kind of weird right now because I announced to the team a few months ago that I was not coming back, that I was leaving. I didn’t tell Mike for various reasons; I wanted to tell him just at the end for the shock and whatever,” he admitted. “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.”

Of “The White Lotus'” 15 Emmy Awards, Tapia de Veer can take credit for three — Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music and Outstanding Music Composition for a Limited or Anthology Series, Movie or Special for Season 1 in 2022, and Outstanding Music Composition for a Series (Original Dramatic Score) for Season 2 in 2024. He also worked alongside “Smile” collaborator Kim Neundorf for the Italy-set second season.

“There was a French movie, ‘La Cage Aux Folles.’ You know how 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? To me, the show felt very much like that,” the composer elaborated.

According to Tapia de Veer, he and White disagreed on just how upbeat the music of the series should be, with the writer wanting “something you would listen to in Ibiza in some clubby place with a chill, sexy vibe.”

“There’s literally no edge to it. It’s a good song; it’s nice music. There’s just absolutely no — whatever you find in the ‘White Lotus’ music, the relationships with the characters — there’s none of that. It’s just nice background music,” he recalled. “I just stuck to what I was doing. And when I was giving versions, it was still the same thing: There were still crazy people and screaming and stuff like that. From there, it became this weird relationship of how do I pass all this weird music into the show?”

However, things behind the scenes are said to have gotten “hysterical” at points.

“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. He thought it was a good idea. But then 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.”

Still, regardless of the former co-workers’ apparent differences, it’s impossible to deny the second season’s cultural impact, in part, thanks to that theme song.

“I was watching the Emmys and it’s like, 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,” the musician shared. “People don’t remember, but at first, some people were complaining about the music: ‘I can’t concentrate on the characters, it’s too much and I’m so stressed out.’ But I’m really happy to take those kinds of risks. That is the main thing that I’m most happy about. It was worth all the tension and almost forcing the music into the show, in a way, because I didn’t have that many allies in there.”

“The White Lotus” Season 3 finale airs Sunday on HBO and Max. All three seasons are available to stream on Max.

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