photographY terence connors STYLING Julianna Alabado WORDS Kate Lancaster
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After almost three decades in Hollywood, Leslie Bibb is finally receiving the recognition she has long deserved
Bibb briefly pauses her dismissal of the alerts to laugh at a message from her best friend and co-star in season three of The White Lotus, Aimee Lou Wood, who’s pinged her with a joke. “We were laughing about how everybody thinks the Emmys look so fancy,” Bibb explains. “But there I was in couture and the [red] carpet was soggy so my dress was getting wet. We were just cracking up at the reality versus the perception that people have.”
I had watched it all unfold from my desk in Sydney just hours earlier, as Bibb posed for photos alongside longtime partner Sam Rockwell. Her statuesque figure was clad in a strapless black velvet gown from Giorgio Armani’s final collection. The designer’s passing less than two weeks prior turned Bibb’s tailored ensemble into an unexpected homage to Armani’s sartorial legacy – “an honour” that Bibb says was well worth dodging a few puddles for. “Nobody tailored like that man did,” she adds.
Talent: Leslie Bibb
Editor: Georgie McCourt
Creative Director: Rebecca Rhodes
Stylist: Julianna Alabado
Photographer: Terrence Connors
Hair: Jacob Rozenberg
Makeup: Sonya Meesh
Producer: Jean Jarvis & Robyn Fay Perkins
Wearing: Louis Vuitton and Van Cleef & Arpels.
Marie claire’s cover shoot took place before our interview, on what Bibb notes was “the hottest day in New York”. The oppressive city heat was so intense that members of the crew all but stripped off in a bid to cool down, but Bibb was a pro amid the sticky conditions. “For the last shot, I was in a sprinkler system and I was like, ‘Thank God,’” she recalls. When we speak, she hasn’t yet seen the images, and I detect a touch of uncertainty in her voice as she asks what I thought of them. I confess that I, too, have yet to see the final result, but I’m intrigued by her response, particularly as Bibb got her start as a teen model. “I don’t love looking at myself,” she admits. “I love taking photos – the art of it. But once it’s done I’m my own worst critic. I can be an asshole to myself. I’ll think, ‘You could have done this better,’ even though it’s over.”
This discomfort isn’t limited to photoshoots. Bibb admits that she rarely watches her own performances, preferring to keep the experience of acting separate from the self-scrutiny that follows. “I don’t sit around and watch myself,” she says. “For me, it’s about the ‘doing’ of it and being present in the work. Once it’s out in the world, it belongs to everybody else.”
Bibbs
Hollywood can be a volatile arena, but Bibb has found her people. She credits Wood, in particular, as a constant source of laughter and grounding. “Aimee Lou and I were talking about this today. I don’t want to be around people who don’t inspire me creatively, emotionally or mentally,” she says. “I feel like I spent the first half of my life thinking it was me against the world – like, ‘I’m tough, I can do it, I don’t need anybody’ – but it’s such bullshit. It’s a defense mechanism for a fear of rejection. It’s far more interesting to risk vulnerability by saying you need a community, you need connection.”
Fittingly, it’s at this very moment that the door to Bibb’s hotel room opens and she pauses to greet Rockwell. “Hi honey!” she says fondly, before turning back to me, “My husband is home – or my partner is home,” she corrects herself with a laugh. Though they’ve never legally married, both admit they might as well be. The pair had a chance encounter in 2007, upon perhaps the most fertile ground for a Tinseltown meet-cute: the famed Chateau Marmont. Bibb – holding fast to what she now views as a misguided notion of independence – told Rockwell she was only interested in something casual. Eighteen years later, they’ve built a relationship that’s deliberately low-key: no children, no official paperwork but steady and loving. On red carpets, they’re playful; at home, they’re peers, often reading lines for each other and swapping notes on scripts. They have collaborated on projects over the years, most recently with Rockwell appearing on Bibb’s season of The White Lotus, which featured a standout monologue and earned him a 2025 Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor.
The show’s first season received mixed reviews from critics. Although the initial 10 episodes of Palm Royale were praised for the decadent costuming, stunning visual spectacles and a heavy-hitting cast – led by Kristen Wiig, and also including Ricky Martin, Carol Burnett, Allison Janney and Laura Dern – a common consensus was that the plot felt a little patchy. Bibb gets the confusion, lamenting, “If you look at season one, it started here and then sort of went there, and you were like, OK, Evelyn [Janney’s character] is speaking to a whale – what the heck is happening?” In the upcoming second season, however, Bibb believes creator and writer Abe Sylvia has found the right lane for the series. “Laura Dern [who is also a producer] called me and she’s like, ‘It’s so good.’ It’s delicious and fun and funny. All the same clothes, hair and makeup, but tonally everything just got focused.”
Of course, part of the joy of Palm Royale is the company Bibb keeps. She lights up when talking about the women she shares the screen with: Wiig as the relentlessly scheming Maxine, Janney’s imperious Evelyn and Dern’s feminist agitator Linda. “You pinch yourself working alongside women like that,” she says. “They make you better, sharper.”
Each of these women, she realises, has shaped her embodiment of the next, one character quietly guiding her towards another. Brooke’s self-doubt bled into Kate’s careful façade; Carley’s scrappiness paved the way for Dinah’s tenacity, and her own life experiences have been the connective tissue. Looking back now, Bibb admits she once wanted her career to move at a greater pace, but time has given her perspective. “I used to be impatient. I wanted things to happen faster,” she says. “Now, I wouldn’t have written it differently.”
Her hard-won patience has indeed paid off, prompting her to be less guarded and seek out vulnerability within others. At last night’s Emmys, an exchange crystallised what Bibb has come to believe: that the work is only as good as the honesty you bring to it. A fellow actor approached her during a commercial break with an unexpected confession: “Thirteen years ago, I was rude to you. I was drunk.” I refrain from immediately googling potential suspects in attendance, as Bibb explains that what had the potential to be an awkward interaction quickly evolved into something deeper. “We ended up having this fast and furious, really honest conversation about sobriety and vulnerability,” she recalls. “I asked them, ‘Do you find getting sober has made your work better?’ And they said, ‘100 per cent’. Because before, they were too scared to really look at things.”
Leslie Bibb wears Comme des Garçons shirt, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels earrings, $22,900, and rings (from top), $22,900 and $15,500.
“I think self-awareness is everything. Accountability is sexy. Vulnerability is sexy”
It’s an arrangement that works because they understand both the glamour and the grind. Vulnerability, after all, needs somewhere safe to land, and the couple are resolute in their admiration and respect for one another. Together they have learnt to celebrate the highs and absorb the lows while keeping the centre steady. In Bibb’s telling, that steadiness is what allows her to take more risks in her work and in life. “Sam always lights me up,” she says simply.
Rockwell’s own career – including an Oscar-winning turn in Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri in 2017 – has had its share of peaks and valleys, much like Bibb’s. She sees her time in the industry not as a straight ascent but rather a series of chapters, with each one equipping her for the next. “Sometimes jobs are prepping you,” she reflects. “You’re starting to investigate something you’ll use later. Life makes acting better. Experience deepens the work.” Looking back, she can trace the line between characters she has portrayed: her breakout in 1999 as Brooke McQueen, the picture-perfect prom queen masking insecurity in Popular; Carley Bobby, the quick-witted, firebrand wife of a NASCAR champion in 2006’s Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby; and now Dinah in Palm Royale. Lest we forget Kate Bohr in The White Lotus, the composed wife of a wealthy Republican with a razor-sharp blonde “c---y little bob” (courtesy of Bibb’s hairstylist, Chris McMillan) and a penchant for gossip and conservative values. “Kate is like Brooke McQueen,” says Bibb. “She’s the prom queen on the outside, but inside she feels like the nerd. Dinah’s the opposite: she could be panicking inside, but she’s resourceful and quick on her feet.”
Left: Louis Vuitton vest, $2160; Van Cleef & Arpels rings (from left), $22,900 and $15,500. Right: Loewe dress, POA; Gucci shoes, $1550; Van Cleef & Arpels necklace, $41,800.
Emporio Armani blazer and pants, both POA; Damiani necklaces.
Fendi blazer, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels necklace, $41,800.
Dolce & Gabbana jacket and dress, both POA.
Now, Bibb trusts that her new-found appreciation for raw candour is shaping what is meant for her next. She’s recently been inspired by the books she’s reading – she’s currently absorbed in Eve Babitz’s razor-sharp essays, after devouring Didion & Babitz by Lili Anolik while filming Palm Royale – and wonders if she might try writing something of her own one day.
“At this point in my life, I think self-awareness is everything,” she says. “Accountability is sexy. Vulnerability is sexy. ‘No’ is a complete sentence. ‘I’m sorry’ is a complete sentence.” It hasn’t been a smooth journey to get here, but Bibb has little interest in playing to perfection anymore. She’d rather reveal the messy truth underneath.
She recalls a recent conversation with Dern, who told her plainly, “Your voice matters.” For Bibb, it was a turning point. “I think I used to dismiss my voice or be scared to say [things],” she admits. “Now, I’m not holding back.”
Season 2 of Palm Royale is streaming on Apple TV+ from November 12.
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ou would never guess that Leslie Bibb is exhausted. Looking fresh-faced, open and relaxed in the fading light of late afternoon Los Angeles, the Palm Royale star flashes a cheerful smile as she settles in for our chat. It’s the day after the Emmys and the 51-year-old is apologetic as she addresses a sudden flood of notifications on her phone. It’s the first time she’s used the device since attending the awards, so her messages are now coming through on a delay.
“I feel like I spent the first half of my life thinking it was me against the world ... but it’s such bullshit”
“I don’t sit around and watch myself ... Once it’s out in the world, it belongs to everybody else”
During the awards ceremony, Bibb traded compliments with Kristen Bell, who also wore Armani Privé. While neither The White Lotus nor Bell’s Netflix comedy Nobody Wants This walked away with a win on the night, the pair giggled about the budding bromance between Rockwell and Bell’s husband, Dax Shepard. “Kristen joked that our partners must be in love with each other because they go to the gym together,” Bibb recalls with a laugh. “I replied, ‘Aren’t we lucky?’”
Bibb and Rockwell skipped the afterparties in favour of their preferred ending to a star-studded evening. Back at the hotel, “Sam unzipped me in three moves,” she says. “I put on PJs, we ordered a steak, and we were in bed by 10 watching All the President’s Men.”
With a career spanning almost three decades, Bibb has lived within Hollywood’s contradictions – the couture and soggy carpets, moments of applause and the stretches of self-doubt – long enough to know that the only thing that’s really important is what awaits you at home. She enjoys the glamorous aspects of the job, sure, but admits to viewing it all as a performance – another costume to be shed like the lashes and hair extensions after a day on set.
Left: Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello dress, $6400, and shoes, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels necklace, POA; stylist’s own sunglasses. Right: Heirlome top, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels earrings, $31,200, and ring, $21,100.
That separation has allowed her to lean fully into characters such as Dinah Donahue, the brittle yet magnetic Palm Beach socialite she plays in the comedy-drama series Palm Royale. On screen, Bibb is all lacquered hair, cat-eye liner and flawless nails as a woman who wears her glamour like armour. Dinah is dazzling yet deeply compromised, which is what Bibb finds irresistible in a character. “Dinah looks at vulnerability as weakness,” she explains. “Women at that time always had to keep a front, and it’s exhausting. Even though she seems like a narcissist, she has a moral compass ... she does end up doing the right thing.” She’s referring to the era in which the show is set: the late ’60s. But the show’s version of that period bears a more striking resemblance to the modern day than you would likely expect. Beyond country club bouffants and grasshopper cocktails, Palm Royale takes on issues that remain politically charged today. The satire may be heightened, but there’s a creeping familiarity to the dilemmas faced by the characters. Dinah’s secret pregnancy and decision to terminate in the first season gave Bibb one of the show’s most human storylines, which hits different considering the recent challenges to reproductive rights in the US.
“In 1969, your only currency was your social standing and how you looked. In a way, it feels the same now with Instagram,” Bibb says of the series’ resonance. That’s not to say that the Apple TV+ show doesn’t delight in aesthetics, taking the wonderfully absurd backdrop of ’60s high society and dialling it up to the most camp extremes in set decoration and costuming. To shape Dinah, Bibb drew inspiration from Sharon Stone’s “perfect” performance as Ginger in the 1995 film Casino. Like Ginger, Dinah knows appearance can be a weapon to wield. “As soon as that wig goes on, or the cat eye goes on, it just changes you completely,” she adds. “I kept the long nails through filming, even though they drive me crazy in real life.”
Louis Vuitton jumper, $19,300, and skirt, $18,700; Van Cleef & Arpels earrings, $65,000.
BOBS
Zimmermann dress, $2750; Van Cleef & Arpels bracelet, POA.
Left: Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello dress, $6400, and shoes, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels necklace, POA; stylist’s own sunglasses. Right: Heirlome top, POA; Van Cleef & Arpels earrings, $31,200, and ring, $21,100.