Haley Lu Richardson may have parted ways with the endless stream of Aperol Spritz, but she hasn’t given up la dolce vita quite yet.
The White Lotus star filmed in Sicily for five months, each day filled with heavy pours of wine, plump plates of pasta, and rich people bickering over inane nonsense. While Richardson didn’t partake in most of those arguments—she plays Portia, the assistant of Jennifer Coolidge’s returning character Tanya—she did enjoy the wine, pasta, and Italian lifestyle.
In fact, Richardson fully immersed herself in Sicilian society, shacking up at her own place instead of a hotel with the rest of The White Lotus cast. She wanted some space from the job, especially since her cat Darbin made the trek to Sicily with her. “They call all apartments there villas,” she says, quickly correcting me after I refer to where she stayed as her “apartment.”
It’s a joke—one that’s similar to the Italian study abroad “We ate FRESH pasta out of the Trevi fountain” meme—but Richardson’s sticking to the villa bit. During our recent Zoom call, ahead of The White Lotus Season 2’s premiere, she quips that we should call all shoebox New York apartments “villas.” This Italian stint has certainly had a lasting impact on Richardson, who, apart from adding the word “villa” to her lexicon, has now opted for the classic Mediterranean garlic/wine diet.
“I drank a lot of wine last night with my stylist while picking out an outfit for the premiere next week,” she confesses, as if she were still an Italian local. Then, later: “We drank a lot of wine. And I ate a lot of garlic. I have garlic hangover breath. It’s great when you’re having it, but then the next day, there’s problems with both of those things.”
And because she’s gone so far as to tell me about her morning breath—clearly, we’re fast friends—Richardson already has two premiere dress options pulled up on her phone to show me, asking for my opinion. One boasts feathered periwinkle sleeves and a bubbly Moschino print; the other is a patchwork maxi-dress, a more luxurious version of a dress one might see on a Free People rack. She tells me that, if she were to go with the purple feathered frock, she’d pair it with a new pair of knee-high black leather boots she’s been dying to wear.
Sold. I place my vote for the feathery getup.
“It’s so cutie,” she says, agreeing. I joke that my vote, as a journalist in a turtleneck, doesn’t actually mean anything, but she insists: “It does count! Your voice matters.” Richardson is so sincere—the next week, she’s sporting the Moschino feathers on the red carpet at The White Lotus’ Los Angeles premiere.
Though she’s willing to chat about her premiere dress and her hangover, Richardson does hold back one tidbit of information—no matter how big of bubbly gossips we both are. A video of the actress giggling as she shows her phone to co-star Theo James has gone semi-viral because of James’ look of utter disgust after he sees what’s on Richardson’s screen. What in the world was she showing him?
“Adam [DiMarco, another co-star] sent me that the other day,” Richardson says about the video with a nervous laugh. “Honestly, I do remember what I was showing him, but I do not think that it is appropriate to, um, share at this time. It’s definitely something bizarre and something inappropriate.”
The way Richardson gushes about The White Lotus is the same way a teenager might rattle on and on about their time at summer camp, spilling about young love and sneaking out after dark. On one of the last days on set before wrapping, a gaggle of the cast (DiMarco, Leo Woodall, Meghann Fahy, Beatrice Grannó, and Simona Tabasco) drank a whole vat’s worth of wine, bought one of those annoying singing cacti, and played truth or dare in the heart of Rome. Richardson admits that she and Woodall, who plays her summer fling in the show, were the best at the game.
“[Leo] and I were a great dare duo because I come up with the craziest shit, and he’s down to do it. Honestly, thank goodness other people that were there were a bit more, uh, smart,” she says. Once again, she won’t tell me the specific dares, deeming them too inappropriate for our convo. “I felt like I was a teen, like a 15 year old, and I was outta town, running away from home. It was so freeing.”
But as all relationships do, these friendships took time to form. From the start, Richardson was on her own, in a country thousands of miles away from home, working a job that required her to be on set six days a week for 20 hours at a time. It drained her. Luckily, Darbin, her sweet cat (who, she tells me, has a tendency of massaging her uterus), was always around for emotional support.
“Whenever you go somewhere for a job—and my job is extra vulnerable and convoluted in a lot of ways—you’re far away,” Richardson says. “I was meeting new people. A guy I was dating at the time came and visited me. We had a little adventure, and then, you know …” She drifts off. “But it was mainly just me and Darbin. He’s my soulmate.”
Richardson is serious about this: Recently, her friend bought her a cat astrology book, which stated that Richardson (a pisces) and Darbin (a cancer) are meant to be, when it comes to pet horoscopes. Pet-and-owner astrological compatibility is different from the usual human pairings, she tells me, which leads to a deeper connection between her and her pet.
Because she was meeting massive TV legends like Parks and Recreation’s Aubrey Plaza and The Sopranos’ Michael Imperioli, Richardson says she relied on Darbin to keep her level-headed. Soon after she arrived in Sicily, though, she realized that working with icons like these wouldn’t be as daunting as she once feared it might be. In fact, many of her scenes are with Imperioli—who, ironically, played a comforting role similar to Darbin in her White Lotus journey.
“Michael is honestly one of the most emotionally aware and grounded people I’ve ever met,” she says. “I really was thankful for his energy on this job because like I was saying, acting and being on a freaking set with all these people, 20 hours a day, six days a week, doing all this vulnerable stuff in front of them can be so chaotic and overwhelming. I loved any time I got to work in scenes with him because I just liked being around him.”
With Darbin and Imperioli as her emotional support system, Richardson set off on the Italian adventure of a lifetime.
Before Richardson could even dream about being in The White Lotus, the actress sent creator Mike White a love letter.
A few years before The White Lotus premiered, as she watched movies like School of Rock and Brad’s Status (White wrote both and directed the latter), Richardson was driven to write the filmmaker a note in admiration of his work. She thinks he read it, but doesn’t know for sure. Particularly enamored of the “perfect mixture of humanity and disconnect” as well as “spirituality, but not in a sappy way” in White’s films, Richardson begged him to work with her on his next project.
“That is what I want to do. I want to do projects that explore life in a way that feels like people can watch it and be like, ‘Oh my god, that’s life!’ You know? After that, I became pretty hooked on the idea of working with Mike,” Richardson says. “I got scared to ever send it, and then I finally emailed him word-for-word the letter. I don’t know if he responded.” (Mike White was unavailable for comment.)
When Richardson finally got an audition to play Olivia Mossbacher in Season 1 of The White Lotus, she was stoked. Unfortunately, she had just signed onto another role and wouldn’t be able to film—the part went to Sydney Sweeney instead.
“Sydney Sweeney was so perfect for that role. She was so deadpan. I don’t think I could’ve said some of those lines. I don’t think it would’ve worked coming out of my face,” Richardson says, at peace with it now. “I’m so glad it worked out the way it did, because I do feel like Portia’s a little bit more of an adult character.”
Sure, Portia’s technically an adult, but she’s not quite there yet, maturity-wise. Within the first 10 minutes of Episode 1, Tanya nearly forces her depressed assistant off the island, because the young girl bugs hubby Greg (Jon Gries), taking away from the couple’s romantic time. But Portia stays. Still, she’s forced into the shadows of the White Lotus’ Sicilian resort, hiding from Greg but still in Tanya’s line of sight, in case anything goes awry.
Portia is, in a word, frazzled. She hates her life, but hey, at least she’s self-loathing in Sicily! Assistant work doesn’t look that tough (attending tarot card readings with Jennifer Coolidge isn’t the worst gig in the biz), and yet, Portia is constantly upset about everything. She sticks out like an American tourist, too, sporting goofy swan sweater vests and white Converse everywhere she goes, while the rest of the women guests don dazzling dresses.
“I liked taking cute pieces of clothing and then putting them together in a way that was not. She’s trying to look upscale,” Richardson says. “Because Portia is lost. She doesn’t know who she is. She’s really trying, you know, she’s desperately, with so much angst, trying to find her purpose and her fulfillment in life.”
At the White Lotus resort, luckily, Portia finds her gioia di vivere (joi de vivre, in Italian): flirting. Boys. Hot fellas. The down-on-her-luck assistant soon faces an FBoy Island-esque decision. Should she go with sweet Albie (DiMarco), a nice Italian-American kid on a boy’s trip with his father (Imperioli) and foul-mouthed grandpa (F. Murray Abraham)? Or will she opt for the sexy Jack (Woodall), a constantly shirtless Brit, who can promise a good time?
“When I was auditioning for the show and my original ideas of Portia, what I was sent in these character descriptions was like, ‘Oh, so she’s going to kind of be the more grounded, earnest character in this season, to all of these kind of crazy, narcissistic, totally unaware personalities,’” Richardson says. “And I quickly realized she’s actually not. She’s very selfish. She’s kind of honestly like a mini Tanya in a lot of ways.”
Speaking of Tanya, Richardson raves about acting alongside Coolidge, a perfect scene-partner. “In so many scenes, I’m just reacting to her,” Richardson says, still astonished by how unique the actress is. There’s a Vulture profile of Coolidge from the first season of The White Lotus prominently featuring Coolidge’s hilarious texting style, and I have to ask Richardson if she received any funny messages from Coolidge herself. Though Coolidge was too busy to hang around the cast this season, Richardson does remember sporadic texts that made her chuckle.
“I would get one text from her that was really detailed telling me about this dream of hers that I was in. I’d respond,” Richardson recalls. “A week-and-a-half later, she would respond to the text I sent—or just, like, heart the text. I don’t think she’s the best texter, but it didn’t really matter to me. She’s Jennifer Coolidge!”
While chatting about her scenes with Coolidge, DiMarco, and Woodall, Richardson keeps using the word “disconnect.” Portia is “disconnected” from Albie the first time they go on a dinner date. All of the wealthy people arguing at the White Lotus are “disconnected” from the beauty of Sicily. Each of them thinks they’re the main character, when really, there’s much more to life than bitterness and ego.
“There’s so much disconnect in life,” she says, using that word again. “Mike is so observant about these fucked up things of how humans actually are, deep insecurities and vulnerabilities and desires that make us live in our own worlds and not actually connect to the people around us and the things that really matter at the end of the day.”
A pause. Then, in complete awe, she asks, “How is Mike putting this all in one hour? You feel so invested.”
Richardson doesn’t regret sending that love letter to White years ago. Clearly, things worked out for them. But she did send her kind words before she had seen the filmmaker’s cutthroat season of Survivor from 2018—he’s the runner up, and he makes it to the end by backstabbing on a bed of lies. Richardson watched the season with Fahy and DiMarco on set for The White Lotus, which gave the trio a completely different view of their director.
“Oh my god,” she exclaims. “It honestly made me a little bit scared of Mike because I was like, ‘This man is so smart.’ He has the power to be an evil, manipulative genius—he knows what he’s doing! He fucking knows and that’s terrifying.”
When it comes to creators who take Richardson’s “Oh my god, that’s life!” manifesto to heart, indie director Kogonada takes first place. The pair worked together on 2017’s Columbus and this year’s After Yang. Neither are anything likeThe White Lotus. But they feel spiritually connected in some way—likely thanks to Haley Lu Richardson, who has vouched to only sign onto projects that feel real. You won’t catch any of The White Lotus cast gazing at architecture in Columbus, Indiana. But all of the characters involved in both White’s and Kogonada’s work feel so authentic, so true to life, in good ways and bad.
It’s Columbus that resonates with Richardson the most. The film follows another lost young woman trying to sort through her life and, for once, put herself first. Casey (Richardson) has spent years in the tiny Indiana town taking care of her mother while admiring its architecture. A spiritual connection with visitor Jin (Cho) shakes her awake. It’s clear that Richardson could talk about this movie for hours, and I could too. (Anyone who falls in love with Portia on The White Lotus is now required to watch Columbus.)
“I’m saying this in the least narcissistic, self-indulgent way possible, but it’s actually one of my favorite movies I’ve ever seen,” Richardson says. “That was the first time I was ever like, ‘Oh my god, I was invited to be a part of art.’ Kogonada saw me as an artist, like a collaborator. The whole energy of making that movie was really the first time I was invited to make art and be an artist. To be seen in that way—it was amazing.”
Before The White Lotus Season 2 heats up, Richardson made a pilgrimage back to Columbus with Kogonada and her co-star John Cho in September. The decision to go on the trip, in honor of the film’s fifth anniversary was a “no brainer,” Richardson says. She was so pleased that she had the opportunity to rewatch the film and be with her “favorite people I’ve ever worked with.”
To celebrate, the mayor of Columbus commemorated their return as “National Columbus Movie Day” and gave Richardson, Cho, and Kogonada certificates that declared them “Honorary Hoosiers.” The film has resonated with the residents of the town, and Richardson says she made lifelong friends while filming.
“I only have good feelings that burst out of me when I think about being there and the experience of making that movie, and the people I met when I lived there, and Kogonada and John and all of them,” she says. “Honest experiences like this are what keep me going in this.”
As she talks about Columbus, Richardson mentions that the movie was one of her “fulfilling” acting experiences, as opposed to the ones that are “draining.” Because we’ve just been talking about emotional support animals and 20-hour days filming in Sicily, I have to ask what kind of experience The White Lotus was. She pauses to think about it, hung up on the dichotomy between exhaustion and contentment.
“I guess giving yourself emotionally is draining in a way,” she says. “But what’s cool about that is, like after an amazing therapy session or if you’re with someone you love, even if you go through a hard time, you come out of it on the other end. And you realize that you had a hard time because you have this love and you had to work through it together. You have something that you love so much or that you were able to feel so deeply—that, in and of itself, feels deeply fulfilling.”
So, she settles on both. Like a drunken night out on the town, acting in The White Lotus was both fulfilling and draining. Now, she’s ready for more sets like The White Lotus to exhaust her completely.
“I have an intense hunger. I want to bring everything that I know that I have to the table, but I want to be working with people and working on projects that bring all these other things out and that are equally as what I feel like I have to offer. I want to be pushed. I feel very hungry for that right now, in my life and career. I haven’t felt that hunger as intense for the last couple of years,” she says, “but now I really feel like I’ve honed in on what’s important to me moving forward.”
Bring on the exhaustion, the long shoots, the rawness of acting in a scene that feels ripped straight from real life. Haley Lu Richardson’s got her soulmate emotional support animal (and Michael Imperioli) by her side to get her through anything.
