The White Lotus Season 3 Episode 5 “Full-Moon Party” on HBO winds up being quite the raucous night of fun for TV star Jackie (Michelle Monaghan) and long-time besties Kate (Leslie Bibb) and Laurie (Carrie Coon). The three ladies get wasted with their wellness advisor/butler/eye candy Valentin (Arnas Fedaravicius) and his Russian pals, living it up first in the club and later back at their villa’s pool.
**Spoilers for The White Lotus Season 3 Episode 5 “Full-Moon Party,” now streaming on MAX**
The night crescendoes with Jackie secretly sleeping with Valentin. Jackie, of course, is married to a much younger (and probably adulterous) heartthrob, which means this is adultery. It’s also another kind of betrayal since she’s been scheming to hook him up with single friend Laurie all week. Nevertheless, Jackie gleefully invites the hot hotel employee into her bed, grinning like a cat lapping up all the cream.
Jackie’s decision to sleep with Valentin might be less about desire and more about validation. Earlier in the episode, Jackie feeds off of the jealous looks of younger women as much as she does male attention.
The White Lotus star Michelle Monaghan told DECIDER that Jackie’s behavior in Season 3 Episode 5 is about way more than just debauchery. “We start to see her I guess, sort of kind of devolve,” Monaghan said.
“We see her initially very like in her power, right? This perception, this idea, that she’s this Hollywood actress. She’s very happy. She kind of basically has it all,” Monaghan said. “And then we start to slowly reveal that she’s kind of lonely, I would say, and she’s a little bit sad.”
Monaghan added that as The White Lotus Season 3 goes on, we see the toxic tendencies amongst Jackie and her friends emerge. (I mean, their favorite hobby seems to be talking behind each other’s back.)
“She’s not getting what she needs from the ladies and she needs a little bit more validation,” Monaghan said.
“I think, you know, she realizes she needs to be more stimulated. It’s not happening at this detox place. She wants to get outside in Thailand,” the actress said, explaining Jackie’s insistence last week on having fun. “She wants to go and have a day, have a night.”
Of course, partying with a bunch of Russian ex-pats isn’t necessarily going to mend toxic relationships. “I think there’s a little self-sabotage in in there,” Monaghan added. “And I think she’s trying to fill her cup and looking for validation in kind of all the wrong places.”
Jackie might have said that what happens in Thailand stays in Thailand, but does that mean there won’t be any repercussions for her actions in The White Lotus Season 3 Episode 5 “Full-Moon Party”? Will Laurie learn that Jackie made a move on her man? Does Jackie’s infidelity mean her marriage is over? (And are we in agreement that Valentin’s friends probably did the jewel heist? Or is that just my theory?)
There are only three episodes left in The White Lotus Season 3 to find out…
The post ‘The White Lotus’ Star Michelle Monaghan Says Jackie Starts to “Devolve” in Club Scene: “There’s a Little Self-Sabotage There” appeared first on Decider.
