How Alexandra Daddario Really Feels About Her True Detective Nude Scenes

Audiences who knew Alexandra Daddario best from her role as Annabeth Chase in the teen-oriented "Percy Jackson" fantasy movies were in for a shock in January 2014, when Daddario co-starred with Matthew McConaughey, Woody Harrelson, Michelle Monaghan, and others in the premiere season of the HBO anthology series "True Detective."

Daddario played Lisa Tragnetti, a court reporter having a torrid affair with Harrelson's married detective Marty Hart, and in Episode 2, we see her handcuff Harrelson to her couch before stripping fully nude in front of him and millions of viewers. While the scene is bracing and could be considered exploitative, the actor told Interview Magazine that she didn't read any misogyny into the way the character was portrayed in the show. "It was the first time I was nude for anything, so I was definitely unnerved by that, but I think any implied misogyny is a result of defining the characters," she explained.

"You see Woody Harrelson's character as a family guy and then, all of a sudden, you see him in this very sexual situation with this naked girl," she added. "It just completely changes the way you see him." It certainly changed the way that viewers and Hollywood saw Daddario. She called the attention "very flattering," but took the job to demonstrate that she was capable of doing more adult, challenging fare.

The truth about filming nude scenes is that they aren't always comfortable even for the most seasoned actors, and for Alexandra Daddario, appearing completely naked on camera for the first time in "True Detective" was made infinitely easier by her scene partner, Woody Harrelson.

"He made the whole situation very comfortable," Daddario told MTV News shortly after the episode aired. "It wasn't anything awkward in that sense. I tried not to think about it too much before shooting the more intimate scenes and just sort of did it. [Harrelson] has been there, done that. He's Woody Harrelson. If there's anybody that I was going to be comfortable with, it's somebody like him."

Daddario's gambit certainly seemed to pay off; following her breakout on "True Detective," the actor subsequently landed guest spots in "American Horror Story: Hotel" and "The Last Man on Earth." She later secured a main role in Season 1 of "The White Lotus" and the lead role in the Anne Rice adaptation "Mayfair Witches." On the film front, she's turned up in "San Andreas," "Baywatch," "The Layover" (one of her worst movies, but still worth watching), "We Summon the Darkness," and others. If Daddario feels anything about that controversial "True Detective" moment now, it might just be satisfaction.