The White Lotus’s Haley Lu Richardson thinks it’s “unfair” Portia was labelled a villain

Haley Lu Richardson has said she thinks it’s “unfair” that some viewers of The White Lotus perceived her character Portia as a villain.

• READ MORE: The White Lotus season 2 review: the guests are still awful, the show still utterly addictive

Richardson played Tanya’s (Jennifer Coolidge) young assistant in season 2 of Mike White’s hit HBO series, which aired late last year to critical acclaim.

The role ended up being Richardson’s most high-profile to date, and, speaking on the Just For Variety podcast, she admitted that the spotlight took some getting used to, especially when Portia was criticised by some for seeming entitled or spoiled.

“I just hadn’t been in that situation before, so I did get sad,” Richardson says. “There was probably the first couple of episodes where I was seeing some things and reactions to things with Portia and me that I was taking personally or I wasn’t fully sure how to take it or how to process it.”[via Variety]

She grew to realise that it was a good thing people were talking about the show in such detail. However, she maintained that she thought Portia got more grief than she deserved.

“The one thing that I thought was actually kind of unfair and warped was the people who were saying that she was awful or she was the real villain of the season,” she said. “There’s no way that you can look at that young woman and be like, ‘She is the most awful one on this show.’ People who think that should go to therapy.”

Meanwhile, White has said the door remains open for Coolidge to get her own spin-off show.

“I absolutely think that’s possible,” White told press at the Vivid Sydney Festival this weekend (June 10), as reported by Deadline.

“We were just talking about that. It’s a funny idea,” he added, discussing the potential joy of “making Jennifer 20 years younger” to become a younger version of Tanya.

“That would be fun too,” White added. “I think Jennifer’s like, ‘Sure, let’s do it!’”

The third season of The White Lotus is believed to be set in Thailand, after creator Mike White was reportedly scouting locations there. The first two seasons were set in Hawaii and Sicily respectively, with predominantly all-new ensemble casts in each.

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