Thomas Doherty 'Identified a Lot' with His “Tell Me Lies ”Season 2 Character's Past (Exclusive)

The actor, 29, tells PEOPLE he "saw a lot of my younger self in Leo," the newcomer love interest for Lucy (Grace Van Patten)

Thomas Doherty has made a major splash in season 2 of Tell Me Lies as Leo, but there was a deeper reason underlying the actor's pull to the show.

"I really saw a lot of my younger self in Leo, for sure," Doherty tells PEOPLE of the character, the new love interest for Lucy (Grace Van Patten) who throws a wrench in the never-ending cycle of her and Stephen's (Jackson White) relationship.

"I mean, I'm 29 now, Leo's not quite there yet. But I don't know... I guess that young adult, you leave home and you're in college for the first time and you're on your own and you're trying to establish who you are as a person and create this sense of self, but you're thrust into this environment with hundreds and thousands of other people doing the same thing."

Related: Jackson White Says His Toxic Tell Me Lies Character 'Doesn't Shock Me Ever': 'It's Really Cool Playing the Bad Guy' (Exclusive)

In episode 6, which premiered on Oct. 2, fans got a deeper look into Leo's life and his past, as he revealed to Lucy that his anger issues stem from his own experiences growing up in an abusive household. In an emotional scene — that preceded their breakup — after Lucy slapped Diana (Alicia Crowder), Leo revealed that his dad used to hit him and would do the same to his mom — until one day, he fought back.

"You see later on in the series kind of why Leo is the way that Leo is. And I definitely identified a lot with him in that regard — in that storyline for him and wanting to be his own man and be a better person," Doherty says of Leo's backstory. "And I really, really love the desire for kind of self-improvement [Leo has]."

The Gossip Girl alum says that he not only related to Leo, but he also learned from him.

"Doing what he's doing, his own self-exploration and his own work, coupled with this new girl that he is kind of falling for, coupled with her past and their relationship, it was a big kind of mess of potential anxiety-inducing breakdown stuff. But I even learned from it as well. When Leo was confronted with an external obstacle, he definitely tuned into himself, and I've definitely taken a big chunk of that and tried to do that in my own life."

It's no surprise that Doherty was sold on the role early on. "I already had my mind made up that I wanted to do it, but then meeting Grace [Van Patten], I was like, 'I have got to work with this girl,'" he says, referring to a meet-up at a coffee shop he and Van Patten, 27, arranged before their chemistry read.

"I never want to go in cold being like, 'Hi, nice to meet you, be my girlfriend for an hour.' So I wanted to just feel her energy and feel where she was at," he recalls. "For some reason, I thought I was going to go meet Lucy — that's how good she is at acting, I thought I was meeting Lucy. I remember I walked into the coffee shop ready for Lucy, and then I just saw Grace pop up and I was like, 'Oh.'"

"If I had to do the rest of my career working with Grace, I'd be a happy man. She's just an incredible human being, incredible actor, so funny, so smart — just a wonderful, wonderful human. And so yeah, the chemistry, it really just came naturally."

Related: Tom Ellis Reveals Whether Wife Meaghan Oppenheimer Made Him Audition for Tell Me Lies Season 2 Role (Exclusive)

As much as he raves about working with Van Patten and the rest of the cast, Doherty admits that he felt "emotionally drained" after long days on set.

"It's a very intense world, for sure," he says, before sharing what he thinks fans will need for the last few episodes of the season: "Chamomile tea is what they need."

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New episodes of Tell Me Lies season 2 premiere Wednesdays at 12:00 a.m. ET on Hulu through Oct. 16.

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