If you have been anywhere near the internet in recent weeks, you’re probably aware of the widespread speculation that something went down between Walton Goggins and Aimee Lou Wood during the filming and promotion of the third season of The White Lotus. For reference, the two stars played couple Rick and Chelsea on the show, which came to an explosive end earlier this month.
And the online speculation isn’t entirely without merit, with their costar Jason Isaacs fueling the fire when he described filming the show in Thailand as a “theater camp, but to some extent an open prison camp” during an interview with the Guardian. He added at the time: “You couldn’t avoid one other. There are tensions and difficulties, I don’t know if they spilled from on-screen to off-screen, or if it would have happened anyway. There were alliances that formed and broke, romances that formed and broke, friendships that formed and broke.”
While Jason’s comments could have been about anybody, eagle-eyed fans quickly noted that Aimee and Walton — who initially appeared incredibly close off-screen, had unfollowed each other on Instagram. In fact, some even went so far as to theorize that Walton had blocked Aimee because her comments no longer appear under his posts, although his comments are still visible on hers.
Despite this, Walton did pay tribute to Aimee after the season finale aired, posting a carousel of photos of them together both and off screen as he reflected on his time working on The White Lotus. In the post’s caption, he wrote: “Thank you Aimee Lou for being my partner… a journey I will never forget.”
But on Sunday, things got a little messy when Aimee and Walton had totally opposite reactions to a divisive Saturday Night Live skit that parodied The White Lotus: The White Potus. The sketch saw the SNL cast replace this season’s White Lotus characters with depictions of Donald Trump and his inner circle, with most of the jokes having political undertones.
However, when it came to SNL’s depiction of Aimee’s character Chelsea, played by Sarah Sherman, the only attempts at “jokes” were to mock her physical appearance and intelligence. Jon Hamm played the RFK Jr.-coded version of Walton’s Rick in the skit, and made reference to taking fluoride out of drinking water, to which Sarah’s character replied with a questionable British accent through comically large teeth and with a dazed and bewildered facial expression: “Fluoride? What’s that?”
The entire gag appeared to be hinged on poking fun at Aimee’s teeth, which she has spoken at length about in the past, so it’s pretty understandable that she was not impressed with it. Taking to her Instagram story on Sunday, Aimee wrote: “I did find the SNL thing mean and unfunny xo.”
But while all of this was going on on Aimee’s Instagram page, Walton took a wildly different approach to the sketch on his own. Sharing the full SNL clip to his Instagram story, Walton simply wrote: “SMASHING,” adding: “Jon… I knew I was miscast.”
Interestingly, Walton shared this some time after Aimee had made her grievances clear, so some wondered if Walton was being shady by praising the skit. However, after his post was up on his page for a few hours, Walton notably deleted it from his story without further comment.