Murray Bartlett Thought Leaving NYC Could Hurt His Career — Then Landed The White Lotus

When Murray Bartlett moved to the Provincetown, Massachusetts area a few years ago, he feared that it could cost him acting roles. He'd moved from his native Australia to New York City, after all, to be available for as many opportunities as possible.

But he was drawn to the Provincetown region — an idyllic LGBTQ+ and arts mecca at the tip of Cape Cod — because of the chance to be close to nature, to enjoy woods and beaches away from the tumult of a big city. It felt like the right thing to do at that stage in his life, even if it diminished his professional opportunities.

Then he got his best role to date — playing a pushed-to-the-limit resort employee on the first season of Mike White's The White Lotus. His career exploded just after he turned 50, and The White Lotus led to opportunities on shows like The Last of Us and Nine Perfect Strangers, and in new films like Opus, released earlier this year, and Ponyboi, out later this month. He's been nominated for two Emmys, and is incredibly in-demand.

"I knew I wanted to live here," he told producer Christine Vachon during a Q&A this past weekend at the Provincetown International Film Festival, where he received PIFF's award for Excellence in Acting. "I was nervous at leaving the city but it felt like a thing that was important to me for my life. ... I feel like I followed the things that felt good for me in my life."

That meant he was "happy and grounded," he said, when the opportunity arose, soon after he left New York, to star on The White Lotus. He also started to hone in on the question, "What are the stories that I really want to tell? And so that's sort of been my guiding principle from from then on."

Murray Bartlett on The White Lotus, Looking and More

Vachon, known for such acclaimed films as Far from Heaven, Boys Don't Cry, One Hour Photo, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Carol, May December and the brand-new The Materialists, noted that Murray Bartlett is such a chameleon that the first time they met for a meeting, she passed by without recognizing him.

He recounted for the Provincetown audience on Saturday evening that he got his start as an actor when his brother accidentally knocked out his two front teeth with a hammer, while trying to kill a spider back home in Australia. Bartlett had to go to speech therapy to learn to enunciate after his injury. That involved delivering lots of monologues — and he found that he loved it.

Also Read: Plainclothes Wins Best Narrative Feature at Provincetown International Film Festival

When he started acting professionally, he scored big roles on the Australian shows headLand and Neighbours. When he moved to New York City in 2000, his first big role was on Sex and the City. It made him realize he could make it as an actor in the United States.

Moving to Provincetown wasn't the first time he left New York City, certain that it would hurt his career — and then had the opposite happen. He recounted that he moved to Egypt during the Arab Spring to pursue a relationship with an Egyptian man, and ended up growing a mustache to try to fit in better with the locals.

"A lot of people had facial hair, so I grew a mustache to try and fit in," he told Vachon. "Then I got a call to audition for Looking, and so I just I did my first audition from Cairo, and I'm pretty sure the mustache had quite a lot to do with me getting the role."

His work on White Lotus included a hilariously explicit sex scene that many in the largely gay audience clearly remembered. Bartlett recalled that before appearing on the show, he spoke only briefly with White, mostly about how explicit he was willing to be.

'When I met with Mike, we only had a 45-minute meeting before we started shooting, and that was to talk about — rimming, really," he said.

The crowd erupted in laughter and applause.

"This is a man who knows his audience," noted Vachon.

Main image: Murray Bartlett at the Provincetown International Film Festival. MovieMaker.