Victoria Pedretti Facts Fans Might Not Know

Since her 2018 debut as Nell on Mike Flanagan's "The Haunting of Hill House," Victoria Pedretti has become the new face of horror and thrillers. Whether haunting her family on "Hill House," fighting ghosts in Flanagan's "The Haunting of Bly Manor," or falling for a serial killer on "You," Pedretti has quickly proven herself to be a master of darkness and surprise.

Whatever the genre, her characters are never what they seem; they contain depths that aren't so obvious on the surface, while audiences and critics alike seem to be captivated by her ability to move between spaces of lightness and darkness. She brings subtlety and sensitivity to these roles, which helps her characters stand out in genres where you think you know what to expect.

While Pedretti has been making her mark in television, she's been appearing in some — you guessed it — dark movies as well. She was seen in "Shirley," starring Elisabeth Moss as Shirley Jackson (who, coincidentally, was the author of "The Haunting of Hill House"), and also popped up as a member of the Manson family in Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood," where she rode horses with Leonardo DiCaprio. Pedretti was recently announced as the star of "Lucky," a film based on the memoir by "The Lovely Bones" author Alice Sebold. It's clear that Pedretti will continue to surprise audiences with her complex characters, so here's the untold truth of this actress who's quickly become more than a scream queen.

Although Pedretti may have been emotionally prepared to spend years trying to get an acting job, it didn't necessarily make the reality of that waiting any easier. After graduating from Carnegie Mellon in 2017, Pedretti moved to New York and tried to get work as an actor (more on some of those auditions below) but wasn't getting cast yet. As she told Cosmopolitan, Pedretti's post-college money had just run out and she was about to get a day job when she got the call for Mike Flanagan's "The Haunting of Hill House," a Netflix series based on Shirley Jackson's classic 1959 gothic horror novel. The role was for Nell, the youngest member of the Crain family, who struggles to disentangle herself from the horrors and traumas of Hill House that continuously haunt her from childhood through adulthood.

In an interview with Collider's "Ladies Night," Pedretti mentioned that although her role on "The Haunting of Hill House" didn't lead to a sudden outpouring of acting opportunities, showrunner Greg Berlanti decided to cast her on the second season of "You" after catching her on the limited series. Of course, Pedretti's turn in "Hill House" also opened the door for her to star as Dani Clayton in "The Haunting of Bly Manor." It's no wonder she's been dubbed one of the new scream queens.

If there's one consistency with Pedretti's characters, it's their combination of lightness and darkness (with a significant leaning towards darkness). Pedretti has said that even the things she finds funny are darker, and told InStyle that she's drawn to these more twisted roles. In an interview with Vanity Fair, Pedretti discussed how darker comedies "actually [reflect] the life we're living in and we can laugh and cry from this place of feeling understood and not feeling alone," adding that they reflect life more than sitcoms, which can be a space just for unattainable fantasy.

But filming such heavy stuff can take its toll emotionally, so Pedretti has sought to find lightness on set. She spoke with Oprah Daily about how she deals with difficult scenes, like ones in "You" that involve violence or in "The Haunting of Hill House," when she had to jump off a platform with a noose around her neck. After doing multiple takes of that latter scene, she had to "hug it out afterwards" and "make light of the situation. It's play. We're engaging in pretend." Finding the fun in things sounds like a good approach for these darker situations.

By pure coincidence, Pedretti's first two major roles — Nell in "The Haunting of Hill House" and Love in "You" — are both young widows with fraternal twin brothers who are addicts. The similarities stop there though, as Pedretti told the New York Times that "it was really bizarre to be offered the opportunity to explore these similar experiences through a completely different mind." She goes on to discuss how they're both characters dealing with family trauma in very different ways and, particularly as "You" concludes its second season, it becomes clear just how different those ways are.

Both Nell and Love are highly sensitive people who are in tune with others, but the expression of their sensitivity exists on two ends of a spectrum. Nell struggles to move through the world while being hyper-aware of that which is both seen and unseen (or natural and supernatural) while Love's awareness of other people translates into an impulsive, uncontrollable and violent protection. Love will do anything for her family while Nell can't get out of the shadow of hers. Leave it to Pedretti to play each role so differently and yet so perfectly.

Pedretti has openly discussed how problematic the character of Joe is in "You," telling Glamour that "the idea that people actually want to be with the psychopath and the murderer is a joke" and adding that as soon as he sees Love as a human rather than an idea, he falls out of love with her. While Love isn't the most supportive of women — see her relationship with Candace (Amber Childers), for one — Pedretti isn't like that off screen. In the same interview, Pedretti notes that women are 50% of the population and yet remain an oppressed majority, which "has only been possible by us working against each other." Ultimately, she believes in sisterhood and that women need to support women to achieve equality.

While some of these issues are explored in "You," Pedretti embodies her belief in women's rights in her own life. Pedretti took part in the short film, "This Is Not A Love Letter," a pro-choice video poem written by Isabel Pask. Pedretti shared the video with Glamour UK in 2020, where she discussed the process of working with other women on Pask's film and her own views about abortion and women's rights. It's clear that the elevation of female voices is something she'll continue to do both in her personal and professional life.

Pedretti has built up an impressive resume in just a few years, starring on TV shows like "The Haunting" series and "You" and appearing in Quentin Tarantino's "Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood" alongside Leonardo DiCaprio and Brad Pitt. Pedretti plays things cool on screen but off screen, she can still get starstruck.

Pedretti told Flaunt Magazine that she was handed script pages for "Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood" by Tarantino's casting director, who knocked on her door at 6 a.m. to invite her to read for this mysterious project. Pedretti got the role of Charles Manson follower Lulu and attempted to play it cool when she met Tarantino for the first time, but "failed so miserably." Pedretti went on to have a bit of a surreal experience on "Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood" as she got to see something shot on actual film for the first time and ride a horse next to Leonardo DiCaprio. She also admitted to Cosmopolitan that she once walked into a wall in a restaurant when she got distracted by Jon Hamm sitting at another table. It all goes to show that stars really are just like us.

One aspect that Pedretti shares with her characters is the refusal to play by the rules. In an interview with The Cut, Pedretti refers to these rules as "arbitrary authority," which her artist parents taught her to distrust at a young age. As Pedretti puts it, her parents taught her that "the system is not there to support us, for the most part, and that there are a lot of reasons to be skeptical of people and their intentions." In the same interview, Pedretti notes her discomfort with benefiting from capitalism, which doesn't necessarily adhere to her values. But she adds that it's "out of my control" and all she can do is "try to create the world that I prefer to see." 

Pedretti's lessons from her parents can be seen in the way she discusses these systems of power or "arbitrary authorities." When asked about why Joe gets away with so much in "You," she told Glamour that "he's white. He's a man. He's visibly straight. He's able-bodied. He's benefiting from, historically, us as a culture ... in which we see our heroes looking like him and doing questionable things." It's clear that Pedretti's not interested in contributing to that type of power if she can help it.

Pedretti's characters seem to have shared qualities of sensitivity, even though they use that in different ways. In an interview with StyleLikeU, Pedretti talked about her own sensitivity, which she's learned to accept as a gift instead of a weakness. Pedretti relates an anecdote about going on a rollercoaster and freaking out the whole time until she and her friend got to the front of the line; after the ride, her friend told her that she was terrified too and Pedretti notes how she's always been someone who's let herself express what she was feeling, although others often weren't doing the same. As she puts it: "I feel a lot and sometimes it's horrible, but sometimes it's awesome and it feels good when I can accept it." 

Perhaps some of her work has helped with that acceptance, as she's carried her sensitivity and compassion into the characters of Nell, Dani, and even (or especially), Love. In an interview with the New York Times, Pedretti notes that the "acting muscle is the muscle of empathy," which perhaps explains why characters like Love are able to be embraced by audiences and resonate in spite of some of the terrible things she does.

In Season 3 of "You," Love Quinn (Victoria Pedretti) begins a hot-and-heavy affair with Theo Engler (Dylan Arnold). It's a tumultuous relationship that takes many unexpected and shocking turns throughout the show — as you would expect from this thrilling Netflix series. Not long after the third season debuted, rumors began to swirl that Pedretti and Arnold were a couple in real life after pictures of them together began to surface online. In November 2021, Entertainment Tonight stated that a source confirmed that the two were an official item and had already been dating for a few months.

While Love is shown to be older than Theo in the series, Arnold is actually a year older than Pedretti in real life (per Marie Claire). On-screen, though, Love and Theo's romance is all but over after Love's husband, Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) injects her with poison and sets their house on fire — framing her for all the shenanigans he caused in the season finale.

In "You," Love Quinn loves to cook. It becomes a central part of her character's arc, as Love utilizes food to connect with Joe Goldberg and even opens up a bakery — named A Fresh Tart — in Season 3. Love also finds a sense of serenity while she's dishing up a new meal or pastry — and probably uses the time to conjure up her latest scheme, too. Victoria Pedretti revealed to Byrdie that Love and her do share something in common: a passion for cooking. And thankfully, nothing more nefarious than that.

"I forget that cooking is also a form of self-care," she said. "I feel like I'm able to access a meditative state when I cook. It's awesome." Pedretti explained how she enjoys cooking vegetables and finds it an achievement when she's able to introduce people to new vegetables or get those who dislike them to eat her dishes.