Lili Reinhart Opens Up About Escaping 'Riverdale' and Embracing Indie TV with 'Hal & Harper'

A Star Breaks Free

Lili Reinhart is shedding the Betty Cooper label and diving headfirst into the world of independent television. The actress, who spent seven seasons on the CW juggernaut Riverdale, has finally found the project that allowed her to show a completely different side of her craft: the indie series Hal & Harper.

As detailed in the exclusive report from Screenshot (550).png, Reinhart was at a crossroads when she first got the script for Hal & Harper. She was preparing for the final season of Riverdale and desperately searching for something that wouldn't pigeonhole her into the teen drama archetype. The script hit her like a bolt of lightning.

The Script That Changed Everything

“I was in a position at that point where I wasn’t really getting opportunities like that,” Reinhart revealed. “When we had this first conversation, I was like, ‘I feel really lucky that you’re seeing me through this lens of this woman, who’s a flawed woman and emotional and in this world, when most people know me from Riverdale and [put] a little bit of a label on me, as far as what my wheelhouse is as an actor.’”

Written and directed by Cooper Raiff, the indie series follows codependent siblings Hal (Raiff) and Harper (Reinhart) as they stumble through early adulthood and confront a complicated relationship with their father, played by the legendary Mark Ruffalo. The show premiered at Sundance and was quickly snapped up by Mubi, becoming one of the most talked-about indie TV offerings of the year.

Embracing Silence and Vulnerability

What drew Reinhart to the project wasn't just the opportunity to work with Raiff and Ruffalo—it was the quiet, reflective tone of the series. After years of Riverdale's rapid-fire dialogue and over-the-top drama, she craved silence.

“Cooper really lets the silence speak for itself, and to be honest, that was something that I remember loving and craving after being on a show like Riverdale, where there’s no silence at all,” Reinhart said. She even laughed about a Letterboxd review that claimed half the series was her character taking a bath. “You’re not wrong,” she admitted. “The type of content and movies that I watch are a lot more quiet and slow, and I think because you’re watching humans process emotions, and that’s often a very silent thing.”

Building a Sibling Bond with Cooper Raiff

Reinhart had over a year to prepare for the role, and she used that time to dive deep into the character of Harper. She read Motherless Daughters: The Legacy of Loss to understand the emotional weight of a woman who essentially becomes a mother figure to her brother and father after losing her mother. But equally important was building chemistry with Raiff.

“He and I just naturally had very sibling energy,” Reinhart recalled. “I don’t have a brother—I have two sisters, and he feels like a spiritual brother to me. I feel lucky to have a very talented spiritual brother who wants to work with me as an actor.”

That trust became the bedrock of their collaboration. “I knew what he wanted this to be, and I knew the love he had for each character and for the story, and when someone loves and cares about something so much, you ultimately just surrender to that,” she explained. “I just really trusted how he wanted Harper to be seen.”

A Director Who Reminds You to Feel

Raiff’s directing style was intimate and physical. He would often gesture to his chest, silently signaling Reinhart to tap into the emotional core of a scene. “That’s something that I … looking back, really appreciate, and have taken with me honestly into other jobs, reminding myself to be present in my body,” Reinhart said. She’s now trying to avoid looking at her phone on set to stay fully immersed.

The Bold Childhood Flashbacks

One of the most daring choices in Hal & Harper is the use of adult actors playing the characters as children—surrounded by actual elementary school kids. Raiff didn’t reveal this to Reinhart until they were deep into production. She admits it was uncomfortable but calls it “an actor’s dream.”

“She’s quite emotionally stunted and doesn’t let her emotions come out, and … if she has emotions, doesn’t really sit there and feel them—she’s always in caretaker mode, and that often doesn’t leave space for your feelings,” Reinhart said of young Harper. “I’m lucky that Harper wasn’t this social butterfly nine-year-old, because I think it would have been very hard for me to play a kid version of her who was very outgoing. It was a lot easier to play an uncomfortable version of her … because I, as a then-26-year-old woman, was playing a nine-year-old, and I felt uncomfortable around children … my environment really helped me create the narrative of [being] uncomfortable in my own skin.”

The device adds a surreal, sometimes comedic layer reminiscent of Pen15, but Raiff uses it to deepen the emotional arc. Reinhart noted that it’s purposely ambiguous whether the childhood scenes are real memories or subjective distortions.

Working with Mark Ruffalo

Opposite Reinhart and Raiff is Mark Ruffalo as the siblings’ aloof father, a role that brought a new level of gravitas to the indie production. Reinhart couldn’t stop praising his dedication.

“Someone at his level doesn’t have to show up as hard as he did for an independent television show,” she said. “We felt like his children, and we really deeply cared about him and that he cared about us.”

None of the cast were in it for the paycheck, she emphasized. It was a labor of love that translated into an authentic family dynamic on screen.

A New Chapter and the Struggle of Indie TV

Reinhart’s character Harper also navigates a complex breakup with her girlfriend Jesse (Alyah Chanelle Scott), a storyline that resonates with anyone who has outgrown a relationship in their twenties. “When you’re with someone through any part of your twenties, you’re still getting your sea legs in life, and when you have someone on that journey with you, and then ultimately, you know, you’re outgrowing them, but you feel almost like you couldn’t possibly leave them, because it’s a betrayal to your former self or to that person,” Reinhart explained.

She acknowledges that getting audiences to watch an indie show on Mubi instead of defaulting to Netflix is an uphill battle. “Riverdale is just on Netflix perpetually … people just are going to watch it, whereas getting people to watch an independent show that feels emotional and a bit more of a slow burn is really hard, but I’m really glad that I did it and took that turn,” she said.

What’s Next for Reinhart

Reinhart sees Hal & Harper as “the beginning of the next chapter in my career.” She’s already filmed three drastically different projects in the past year: the horror film Forbidden Fruits, the romance adaptation The Love Hypothesis, and the comedic thriller The Very Best People.

“This whole project to me was such … I feel so lucky, because it’s exactly what I want to do forever—I want to do a little bit of everything,” she said.

Hal & Harper is now streaming on Mubi, and it’s a bold statement from an actress who refuses to be boxed in.

Disclaimer - All celebrity-related content, information, and images on this website are based on publicly available online sources and AI-generated insights/data. Information such as biography, age, career, personal details, and images may change without notice over time. While we strive for accuracy, we do not guarantee the accuracy, completeness, reliability, or timeliness of any information or imagery displayed on this website. This content is provided for general informational purposes only.