Leo Woodall was worried. He was starting to doubt his ability to play a particularly tricky role: Jack, a stealth gigolo posing as an older gay expat’s nephew in the second season of HBO’s latest watercooler hit. Then he remembered his acting teacher’s mantra: “Take the safety belt off,” Woodall says, mimicking the strap’s removal. “You’re on White Lotus. You’ve got this part where you can get away with doing anything, so just go to set and fuck it up. I decided to be braver.”
Since breaking out on The White Lotus, Woodall’s been given plenty more opportunities to court danger. He starred in Netflix’s One Day, a bruising love story based on David Nicholls’s bestseller,
then signed on to play an emotionally stunted math genius in the AppleTV+ series Prime Target, debut- ing January 22. Weeks later, Peacock will premiere Bridget Jones: Mad About the Boy, featuring Woodall as a potential new love interest for Renée Zellweger’s heroine. Roles opposite other Oscar winners like Dustin Hoffman and Russell Crowe will follow.
“It’s been a mad year working with these big dogs,” the 28-year-old London native says during a break from shooting a crime thriller called Tuner—as in piano tuner, “not the fish.” There are other actors in his family, who have helped him navigate the industry. “But they weren’t able to prepare me to work with the likes of Dustin or Russell.”
Trench coat and shorts by Ami Paris; sweater by Brunello Cucinelli; shoes by Vans; socks by Falke; chain by Eliburch Jewelry (top); necklace by David Yurman.Throughout: grooming products by Boy de Chanel.Photograph by Nick Riley Bentham; styled by Nicole Chapoteau.
Woodall had long loved film but never aspired to be onscreen himself until age 19, after seeing Jack O’Connell’s electric performance on the late-aughts teen soap Skins. Could the younger version of himself envision building a career of this caliber? “Fuck no,” Woodall says. “It’s unbelievable how lucky I am. In this industry, the word luck is treated like a dirty word. But I take it, pocket it, and work as hard as I possibly can.”
Since The White Lotus, Woodall has also had to fight for work-life balance. “Doing One Day I didn’t really have a personal life. I knew that I wanted to make that easier on myself in the future,” he says. More recently, he seems to have found the time: he’s in a relationship with Meghann Fahy, his former White Lotus costar. “I’ve become very aware nowadays of how a person can feel overexposed in your private life,” says Woodall. “And it’s not that fun.”
He had a much better time joining the Bridget Jones universe for its fourth and final installment. Franchises aren’t always extended “for the right reasons,” says Woodall, but “this one, as people will see, definitely wraps things up very beautifully.” Acting opposite Zellweger, whom he calls “the warmest person in the world,” Woodall focused on supporting his leading lady. “She’s carrying this whole thing on her back, so I wanted part of my job to be serving whatever she needs.”
Although his eco-friendly character, Roxster, meets Bridget after the death of her husband, Colin Firth’s Mark Darcy, Woodall felt no pressure to fill that character’s shoes. “I was occupying a new space in her life,” he says, “so I didn’t feel like I was replacing him.” Woodall has yet to meet either Firth, who is not credited in the fourth movie, or Hugh Grant, who reprises his role as Mark’s former romantic rival, Daniel Cleaver. “I don’t share scenes with him,” Woodall confirms. “It’s very sad.”
Grant has spoken candidly about his days in the rom-com trenches— sentiments that resonate with Woodall. “There’s definitely pressure being the leading man, pressures you don’t want to think about as a performer,” he says. “Scripted things about characters that can make you look inward, even if it’s just, ‘He’s the most handsome man in the world.’ Like, ‘Oh, I’m not.’ ”
Yet the idea of becoming the next Grant-esque romantic lead suits Woodall just fine. “Hey, I don’t know how old Hugh is—but if I’m his age and have had the career that he’s had, I will be a very happy man.”