Victoria Pedretti

Victoria Pedretti (born March 23, 1995) is an American actress. Her breakthrough roles were Eleanor "Nell" Crain in The Haunting of Hill House (2018) and Danielle "Dani" Clayton in The Haunting of Bly Manor (2020), which established her as a scream queen. She earned additional recognition for playing Love Quinn in You (2019–2023). Her accolades include a MTV Award, and nominations for two Critics' Choice Awards and a Saturn Award.

In film, Pedretti has played Leslie Van Houten in the comedy-drama Once Upon a Time in Hollywood (2019), Katherine in the biographical-drama Shirley (2020), Irma Eckler in the biographical-drama Origin (2023), and Angel in the thriller-drama Ponyboi (2024). She made her Broadway debut playing Petra Stockmann in a revival of An Enemy of the People (2024).

Early life
Pedretti was born in Philadelphia on March 23, 1995. Her father is of partial Italian American descent, while her maternal grandmother was Ashkenazi Jewish. Pedretti was raised Jewish, and had a bat mitzvah. She was diagnosed with ADD when she was seven years old.

Pedretti attended Pennsbury High School in Fairless Hills, where she expressed an interest in musical theatre, and the Carnegie Mellon School of Drama in Pittsburgh, where she earned a BFA in acting in 2017. She revealed in a 2020 interview that she was told by her Carnegie Mellon teachers not to pursue acting: "They were like, 'I don't know if you're cut out for this. Maybe you should try directing.' And I was like, 'That's not easier.'"

Career
Pedretti began acting in 2014, having roles in two short films: Sole where she played the female protagonist, and Uncovering Eden where she played Edie.

Pedretti had her breakthrough starring on Netflix's 2018 series The Haunting of Hill House, in which she played Eleanor "Nell" Crain. She earned Saturn Award and MTV Award nominations for the role and was established as a scream queen. Chad Collins of Dread Central called Pedretti the "soul of The Haunting of Hill House". Lucy Mangan of The Guardian labeled her "scene-stealing". Dakota Moss of MovieWeb wrote that "Pedretti's emotions to the role add a horrifying realism to the character, and viewers can feel all of Nell's pain and anguish to the very end. This is one of the defining roles for Victoria Pedretti, and she's only getting started." She later stated that her experiences with The Haunting of Hill House helped her to grow comfortable playing darker roles in the horror and thriller genres, and that she has "got a knack for" them.

Pedretti auditioned for the role of Guinevere Beck on the thriller series You but did not land the part. The directors later cast her as Love Quinn in the show's second season, after seeing her previous acting work and her chemistry with her co-star Penn Badgley. The second season was released by Netflix in 2019 to critical acclaim. Also in 2019, Pedretti appeared as Leslie Van Houten in Quentin Tarantino's comedy-drama film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which was a commercial success, and earned her a shared nomination for the Critics' Choice Movie Award for Best Acting Ensemble.

In 2020, Pedretti starred as Evelyn Porter in the pilot episode of the anthology series Amazing Stories. She also appeared in the short film This is Not a Love Letter and played Katherine in the biographical-drama film Shirley. A follow up series to The Haunting of Hill House was announced in 2019 with Pedretti cast in the leading role; it was released as The Haunting of Bly Manor in 2020 and saw Pedretti playing Danielle "Dani" Clayton. For the role, she cited Timothée Chalamet's acting in Call Me by Your Name as an inspiration. Alan Sepinwall of The Hollywood Reporter wrote that "Her appealing vulnerability, and her talent for making the supernatural feel like something painfully real to Dani, do a lot of the heavy lifting this time around. Katerina Daley of Screen Rant said that her performance "has absolutely been a star-making one..." Angelica Jade Bastién of Vulture magazine said Pedretti "has proven herself to be one of the most exciting young actors to watch". She was nominated for a Critics' Choice Super Award and won Best Frightened Performance at the 2021 MTV Movie & TV Awards.

Pedretti reprised the role of Love Quinn for the third season of You, which was released on October 15, 2021. Filming was done amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, where the intimate scenes posed a challenge to film: "This is not a show where you can be like, 'Nobody's going to kiss. It'll be fine.' So it took months to figure out how to do it safely. [...] It's weird. We have a rapport. We played a couple before, but it didn't just immediately come back after being in a global pandemic." She was nominated for Best Villain at the 2022 MTV Movie & TV Awards. Also in 2021, Pedretti appeared in singer-songwriter Kacey Musgraves' Star-Crossed: The Film, a companion feature to Musgraves' album of the same name, in a cameo role as a woman participating in a heist. A clip from the film featuring Pedretti later served as the music video for Musgraves' song "Simple Times".

Pedretti was announced in 2021 to star in the film Lucky, based on the memoir of the same name, in which she would be portraying writer Alice Sebold during her freshman year at Syracuse University. However, in November that same year, the film was cancelled after losing its financing. She was announced in 2022 to be headlining the Hulu original series Saint X, but she reportedly left the series due to creative differences, with Alycia Debnam-Carey replacing her in the lead role.

In 2023, Pedretti played Irma Eckler in Ava DuVernay's acclaimed biographical drama film Origin.

In 2024, Pedretti starred as Angel in the thriller-drama film Ponyboi, which was described as the "queer breakout" of that year's Sundance Film Festival. On accepting the role, Pedretti said that "I think the most important films to be made are the ones that deal with subject matters that people aren't well-versed in and with characters they haven't seen before. This was an incredible opportunity for that to happen." She also starred in the short films Fall Risk and Merci, Poppy as Dylan and Poppy respectively. That same year, she made her Broadway debut in the Sam Gold directed adaptation of the Henrik Ibsen play, An Enemy of the People, at the Circle in the Square Theatre. Gold said of her casting that "She worked really hard in auditions and won the part for proving herself a really strong state actor who could take direction and take [it] all on her shoulders..." On her first stage production, Pedretti said that "doing theater, it’s very ideal. I’d love to keep doing this." Greg Evans of Deadline Hollywood believed Pedretti "is ready-made for her strong-willed, occasionally fretful, role".

Personal life
Pedretti briefly dated actor Dylan Arnold in 2021, whom she co-starred with on You. She was reported to be dating actor Fred Hechinger in 2024. She currently resides in New York.

Music videos

 * "Simple Times" (2021), by Kacey Musgraves