Spoiler alert! This discusses the March 23 episode of The White Lotus, “Denials.” The episode can be streamed with a Max subscription if you’re not caught up.
Many of the guests at the titular resort on The White Lotus Season 3 — currently airing on the 2025 TV schedule — have something they’d prefer to keep hidden, and chief among those is Jason Isaacs’ Timothy Ratliff. The embattled financier may be proud of alma mater, but the same can’t be said for Duke University, who has taken issue with the show using its brand, saying it “goes too far.”
Timothy Is Pushed To The Edge In ‘Denials’
So what are the circumstances surrounding Duke’s complaint? In what has to be the least-relaxing vacation ever, Timothy has learned that back home he has been implicated in an illegal business deal. Unbeknownst to his wife Victoria and their children, their return to the United States will likely see them stripped of their fortune, with Timothy possibly facing time in prison.
The situation feels dire to the Ratliff patriarch, and in “Denials,” he considers — via a death fakeout scene, in which he’s wearing a Duke T-shirt — ending his life with the gun he stole from Gaitok (Tayme Thapthimthong). He then imagines how Victoria (Parker Posey) and their daughter Piper (Sarah Catherine Hook) would react to finding his body, so later (and no longer wearing the Duke shirt) he envisions killing his wife first before turning the gun on himself.
He doesn’t go through with it, and Gaitok recovered the stolen gun, so hopefully murder-suicide is off the table for Jason Isaacs’ character. It was still a really tough watch, to be sure, and as far as Duke is concerned, the damage was done.
How Duke Responded To The Latest White Lotus Episode
On March 27, Frank Tramble, Duke University's vice president for communications, marketing and public affairs, released a statement (via TODAY) to say the school did not "approve the use of its marks" on The White Lotus. Tramble continued:
Duke appreciates artistic expression and creative storytelling, but characters prominently wearing apparel bearing Duke’s federally registered trademarks creates confusion and mistakenly suggests an endorsement or affiliation where none exists.
While this part of the statement is broad, suggesting that any series using the university’s clothing might imply an endorsement, one has to think the actions of The White Lotus character in question is what makes this objectionable, specifically the scene in which Timothy is wearing the Duke shirt.
Frank Tramble goes on to address that point, noting that suicide is the second-leading cause of death on college campuses. The statement reads:
The White Lotus not only uses our brand without permission, but in our view uses it on imagery that is troubling, does not reflect our values or who we are, and simply goes too far.
I can see why Duke took issue with this scene in particular, and given the fact that Timothy’s stress has been caused by illegal business activity back home, I can’t imagine they’re thrilled with the character’s association overall to the university.
I have to wonder if they would have said anything if Jason Isaacs had been wearing the Duke shirt during Timothy’s full-frontal scene, but that’s something we’ll never know. Either way I can definitely appreciate them speaking out in service of their students’ mental health.
There’s no way to know if Timothy will don more Duke merch in the season’s final episodes, but if you want to find out if our theories about The White Lotus Season 3 characters play out, as we get closer to solving the shooter mystery, the penultimate episode airs at 9 p.m. ET Sunday, March 30, on HBO and streaming on Max.
If you or someone you know are having thoughts of self-harm, please, call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988.
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