Filming for The White Lotus season 4 is underway in Cannes and along the south of France, with crews shooting between the Château de la Messardière in Saint-Tropez and the Hôtel Martinez in Cannes and Monaco on May 25–26, 2026.
Several principal cast members have been photographed and seen around the shoots: AJ Michalka, Chloe Bennet, Chris Messina and Alexander Ludwig were among those spotted, and a view of the set was visible at the Palais des Festivals in Cannes on May 25, 2026; production stills and on-location images dated May 25 and May 26 show the same stretch of activity. The movement of cameras and talent across high-profile Riviera sites underlines how the new season is staging itself in public places.
The fourth season is explicitly set at and around the Cannes Film Festival, giving the production a built-in context of film-industry spectacle and international attention. The festival concluded on May 23, and the shoot moved into Cannes within days, using hotels and landmarks that are as much a character as a backdrop: Hôtel Martinez in Cannes and the Château de la Messardière in Saint-Tropez are named locations for the shoot, with additional coverage in Monaco.
That setting is a deliberate extension of a pattern: past seasons relocated the series each year — Hawaii, Italy and Thailand — and the production has again chosen a recognizably public, tourism-driven locale where the presence of an active festival will shape scenes and publicity alike.
Not all of the headline details are settled. Reports have Laura Dern replacing a departing Helena Bonham Carter on the season's roster, but production has not published casting breakdowns and the specific characters for this ensemble remain undisclosed. That gap matters because the series’ mood hinges on how new arrivals are slotted into its satirical, holiday-resort framework; an off-camera casting change in the run-up to on-location work raises immediate questions about which scenes were adjusted and why.
The practical picture for readers who want to follow this shoot is straightforward: look for activity at the Palais des Festivals and around Hôtel Martinez in Cannes and for set dressing near the Château de la Messardière in Saint-Tropez, and expect some footage or images to emerge tied to late-May production dates. The use of Monaco as a nearby filming point suggests production is staging sequences across short drives, not a single, closed compound, which explains the visible movement of cast and crew photographed on May 25 and May 26.
What matters next is plain and narrow: the production has started principal photography, but it has not announced when season 4 will air or which actors will play which parts. Those two facts — premiere timing and character assignments — are the clearest unanswered items that will determine both how the Cannes setting is written into the season and how audiences will respond when the show returns.
