Warning: This article contains spoilers for The White Lotus season 3, episode 6, “Denials.”

Ever wake up after a night of hard partying with a sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach, worried that you did something you’ll regret? That’s relatable for anyone who drank too much the night before, but Saxon Ratliff (Patrick Schwarzenegger) is going to be wishing for a regular case of “hang-xiety” after this week’s The White Lotus.

If you thought his scandalous kiss with his younger brother Lochlan (Sam Nivola) was shocking, it turns out that was actually just the G-rated version of what happened during their brothers-gone-wild night in last week’s episode, “Full-Moon Party.” As Saxon and Lochlan woke up hungover on Greg’s (Jon Gries) yacht with Chloe (Charlotte Le Bon) and Chelsea (Aimee Lou Wood) in this week’s installment, “Denials,” their memory of the previous night’s debauchery was hazy. It took a while, but thanks to Chloe and Chelsea’s brutal honesty, Saxon’s own denial was ripped away and the truth came out: Saxon and Lochlan didn’t just kiss. No, things … well, escalated. While Lochlan had sex with Chloe, he used his hand to turn it into a three-some with a very drunk and drugged Saxon — much to Saxon’s growing disgust and horror in the harsh, sober light of the next day.

Schwarzenegger had no idea that his character’s relationship with his brother would cross that line when he landed his season 3 role. “First off, I was ecstatic,” the actor tells Entertainment Weekly. “It was such a surreal moment for me to get the audition and to actually book the job because at that point we just had audition sides. We didn’t have the script and we didn’t really know what we were getting into.”

Sitting next to his onscreen father Jason Isaacs, Schwarzenegger laughs as he admits he should have seen something like this coming. “I mean, we had an idea, it’s The White Lotus and there’s going to be something crazy,” he adds. “And then I started to read the scripts and, yeah, when I got to episode 5 and episode 6, it was like, ‘Whoa. This is wild. This is crazy.'”

Incest is certainly a new taboo for creator Mike White‘s vacation satire to tackle, but Schwarzenegger says he actually wasn’t nervous to portray such a boundary-pushing idea onscreen.

“I have full faith and trust in Mike White and his writing and what he’s done so successfully on other seasons and on other shows,” Schwarzenegger explains. “I remember him texting me and being like, ‘It’s going to be great.’ And it’s going to start a conversation. And you know what, I have to see it — I haven’t seen it yet — but I think it’ll be fun and funny and it’ll be very White Lotus.”

Isaacs, who had seen the episode, immediately complimented Schwarzenegger for his work throughout the scenes as the formerly uptight and arrogant Saxon unravels into a self-conscious and vulnerable shell of who he used to be, slowly at first, and then all at once when the girls confirm his worst suspicions. “You’re fantastic in it,” Isaacs tells him.

Schwarzenegger starts laughing as he asks, “In that scene?”, referring to the flashbacks revealing Saxon and Lochlan’s incestuous moment.

“No, no, no,” Isaacs clarifies. “That, yes, but the aftermath of it? Sensational. I see the change in Saxon. It’s absolutely brilliant.”

Schwarzenegger once again credits White with creating such a thorough road map for him to follow with the script. “What Mike does so brilliantly is it’s a slow roll of Saxon remembering bits and pieces and it’s just this, ‘What the f— happened?!” he says. “All these different things. And it’s a big power shift for Saxon, and how Mike even writes it, from him bossing around his brother and bossing around the girls and stuff like that, to then the dynamic switching and Lochlan having this upper hand, and then the girls kind of antagonizing me at the pool.”

Isaacs loves how the scene with Chloe and Chelsea confronting Saxon about the sexual experience with Lochlan “makes it beyond doubt” that he partook in incest.

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“It’s really a fun moment,” Schwarzenegger agrees. “But he also leaves a lot of it up to interpretation from the audience and from the fans. He wants to not-so-deliberately say everything that happened and show everything that happened. So I think that’s the brilliant part about Mike White.”

As for the actual sex scene, Schwarzenegger appreciated how The White Lotus team created a “very safe environment” for the actors. “Mike is there and holding down the fort and wants to make sure that everyone is extremely comfortable,” he says. “And there’s an intimacy coordinator. It’s a closed set.”

No “hang-xiety” for the actors, at least.

The White Lotus airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on HBO and streams on Max.