To be clear, Richardson’s talents extend far beyond sitting and eating. After building a solid career with roles in heartwarming indie dramas, the 28-year-old’s performance as Portia in the second season of The White Lotus (2022) catapulted her into the spotlight. A lot of people didn’t really vibe Portia. She’s bored and aimless and unsatisfied – so, you know, Gen Z – and some had problems stomaching her mismatched second-hand outfits. However, as people aired their distaste for Portia, everyone fell hard for Haley Lu. There was her unashamed embrace of her past as a “crazed teeny-bopper” Jonas Brothers fan, as well as the time she attended the Vanity Fair Oscar Party and was asked by an interviewer if she was ready to party. Her reply – “No, I think I’m gonna go home, I do. I’m tired and it’s way past my bedtime and my cat misses me and I just want a bath” – went viral with everyone echoing the sentiment: same.

But while the actor is usually very good at the whole chilled out, time-off thing, she’s starting to feel a bit restless and itching for some semblance of normality to resume – which happens just days after we speak, with the actors’ union and studios reaching an agreement to end the historic strike. “I literally can’t imagine crocheting another hat or making another beaded necklace or going on another walk around my neighbourhood,” she says.

It’s also Halloween, and Richardson has her camera off because she’s getting ready for the annual Fright Fest event at Six Flags in Los Angeles. “I look ridiculous, like, I have half a smoky eye on and concealer dots all over my face,” she tells me. As such, I’m staring at a Zoom screen that says “POOPY” and only get a glimpse of the star when she turns on her camera (for the record: she looks great), before she seemingly jump-scares herself and swiftly turns it back off. “I’m sorry, I can’t take myself seriously,” she says, laughing.

And there lies the charm of Haley Lu Richardson. What you see (or, in my case, don’t), is what you get. And what you get is someone who many people resonate with. Because Richardson is a person who has Big Feelings; emotions are full-body experiences that run deep. You can see it in basically any press appearance she gives. Like when James Cordon surprised her with a FaceTime from Nick Jonas and she had the kind of full-blown menty-b that will be familiar to anyone who has harboured a parasocial love for a boy band member. “I have always been like that, but I’ve definitely tried to fight it a bit,” she explains. “When you feel a lot and let yourself show those feelings to people around you, you can feel like a burden. You can feel like you’re too much.”

A particularly resonant fact is how this aspect of her life has affected her romantic relationships. “If it’s not the right match, I’ve been made to feel like I’m, you know, embarrassing or needy or too loud or, uh, I mean, you could literally put any word after ‘too’ and I’ve been called it,” she admits.

Despite being so young when she started working, she doesn’t feel like she lost out. “I definitely feel like I was a teenager,” she says. “Though I didn’t really have crazy wild college years until two years ago.” When probed for more details here (because obviously we need details), Richardson will only share that there was one particular night that involved a bathroom, a two-metre-tall security guard, and getting kicked out of a bar. “Still to this day I don’t think it was my fault,” she says, giving a very convincing delivery of the line many of us have uttered after a night out. “I remember the morning after. I was so embarrassed about what happened, but then everyone I told the story to was like, ‘Haley, we’ve all been there. That’s what college is.’ And I was like, oh, cool, so I’m just experiencing college as a 26-year-old. So yeah, things have been kind of a little bit non-linear.”

As for her direction right now, Richardson turns to her new hobby: tarot card reading. She says she’s been getting the same future card over and over. “I don’t know if it was just ’cause I had a weed gummy before the last time I did it or if it was something mystical,” she starts recalling with a laugh, “but there’s this card called The World and it’s a major Arcana card and it’s the final card in the whole deck. It’s like the embodiment of feeling enough, but not because you’ve got everything you thought you wanted. It’s just like, no matter where you are, you feel full, you feel enough, and you trust that you’re exactly where you’re supposed to be. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that I’ve pulled that so many times. I’m definitely on a journey to getting to a place where I can really just trust in where I am, and that be enough.”