The Four Seasons is nothing like The White Lotus – and it's better off for it

This is an uncanny coincidence, however, as The Four Seasons is neither a nod nor a warning shot towards The White Lotus, deriving its title and premise from a 1981 romcom instead (although it's debatable how many people will recognise that).

Indeed, if a mere clone is what you're expecting, you may need time to acclimate to how diametrically opposed The Four Seasons is from The White Lotus, with Fey's warmhearted comedy-drama effectively serving as the yin to its yang.

Far from feeling like a lightweight tribute act, The Four Seasons is actually a welcome palate cleanser after a slow, uneasy and ultimately feel-bad stay at The White Lotus, approaching its material from an entirely different point of view.

In fact, with its 30-minute episodes and rapid joke rate, the show feels more like a sitcom than a prestige drama, which is a perfect fit for the likes of Fey and co-stars Steve Carell and Will Forte, who all have roots in that genre.

A valid question is, are they playing it a little too safe? For instance, The Four Seasons completely side-steps the class discourse that has always been central to The White Lotus, despite the show's lavish, frequent vacations being beyond what many could hope for.

My general advocacy for class consciousness notwithstanding, the lack of reflection upon how these characters accumulated their wealth is given a pass on the basis that The Four Seasons is squarely and solely focused on the relationships within its clique.

These include three marriages, several fond friendships and one pair of acquaintances hoping not to be left alone for too long (we've all been there), all of which are lent a natural chemistry by the charismatic cast.

Where The White Lotus approaches marriages losing their spark (in season 2) and age-gap romances (in season 3) with a thick coating of cynicism, The Four Seasons tries to find the nuance and optimism in even these uncomfortable scenarios.

When Nick (Carell) abruptly splits from Anne (Kerri Kenney-Silver), his wife of many years, and winds up with his much younger girlfriend Ginny (Erika Henningsen), it provokes the expected disapproving response – from his friends and from us at home.

But as the series progresses, it becomes apparent that Ginny isn't the cliché gold digger represented by The White Lotus's Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon), nor is she infantilised or malevolent in ways depicted countless times before.

She's just an ordinary person, who happens to like her partner and doesn't wish to stir up any trouble with his friends or exes, which you'd like to imagine describes most people (or at least those well into adulthood).

Surely, some will be left wanting by The Four Seasons' less extreme turn of events – i.e. no dead body, and not even a bit of incest – but the show actually ends up feeling more real than its edgier cousin, and arguably more enjoyable too.

I'm not necessarily saying that The Four Seasons is a superior show to The White Lotus if you drill right down into the DNA of each one; after all, there's a lot to be said for White's provocative, ambiguous and unhurried style of storytelling.

But season 3 did feel like an awfully long wait for a relatively small dish, with the screenwriter's cheeky rebuttal that he was "edging" his viewers (see Variety) conveniently ignoring that people typically feel satisfied at the end of that, erm, process.

In contrast, The Four Seasons benefits from bite-sized 30-minute episodes that move at a quick pace, while still managing to define its characters, their histories and hit the key emotional beats.

To put it another way: You can tell that co-creator Fey and her writers have felt the confines of network television by their efficient and concise work here – and in an age when our attention is constantly pulled in countless directions, there's still merit to that.

Above all else, The Four Seasons is a comfort watch in response to The White Lotus's portent of doom; not sugar-coating life excessively but also maintaining a certain optimism that meaningful relationships can endure without succumbing to toxicity.

It's the kind of message that prominent US sitcoms once regularly provided, and we should be grateful that The Four Seasons is drawing from their disused well of ideas – as opposed to the robust supplies of cynicism fuelling The White Lotus and others.

The Four Seasons is available to stream on Netflix from Thursday 1st May 2025. Sign up for Netflix from £5.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.

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