“I feel so lucky that I’ve gotten the chance to hold hands with her as we both grew up,” Anna Cathcart says of her long-time character, Kitty Song Covey.
The 21-year-old Canadian (who still lives in her home town of Vancouver) first brought Kitty, the quintessential meddling youngest sibling in the Covey family, to the screen at the age of 14 in the first installment of Netflix’s To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before franchise in 2018. She continued in the franchise’s subsequent entries, eventually leading its Seoul-set spinoff, XO, Kitty.
The series, much like its movie older sibling, centers on Kitty’s journey to finding love and herself, set against the backdrop of an elite international school in Korea. It quickly found its audience on the streamer, racking up 72 million hours of viewing worldwide in its first week, according to Netflix’s internal figures
Cathcart, on the precipice of a highly anticipated season two, joined The Hollywood Reporter on a Zoom to discuss the upcoming season. She says returning to the character of Kitty feels like she’s “revisiting an old friend” that she hasn’t seen in a while but knows well. “I know this girl and I love this girl so much, but she’s figuring out who she is at the same time as I’m figuring out who I am in my own adulthood,” Cathcart says.
Below, the actress opens up about growing up alongside her character, balancing a hit show with college and how she wants to be perceived as an actress.
What was it like to have your formative years be spent with this character? As you continue to play Kitty, how do you envision it continuing on?
I admire her in a lot of ways, and I think I can learn from her. I’m very lucky to have this weird sense of almost like a friendship in her, even though I know we are one and the same. She is very fearless in a lot of ways that I wish I could be, and she’s very brave because she kind of leads with her heart all the time, and I feel that especially in this season. Sometimes she has so much love inside of her, it just spills out in different moments in different ways. There’s something really courageous about that and really beautiful to see that in a character. I think that is something that I always want to take from Kitty.
When you were younger, being a part of the films, you were there to support someone else’s romantic journey in the show. Now, with XO, Kitty, you’re able to be the lead in that story, where you are getting your own moment to find yourself and find out what it is to be a young person in love. How much do you feel that you’ve learned from that experience yourself?
Starting season two, Kitty’s in a very different space than she was at the start of season one, and she has very different ideas about love and different priorities. As well as a much stronger sense of who she is and what love means to her. I definitely think I’m still on that journey myself in my personal life, of figuring that out. … In general, XO, Kitty just explores [that] growing up is messy and growing up is chaotic, and that’s what makes it special. That is what makes it relatable because no matter who you are, you can’t escape the messiness in that time of your life, and honestly in most times of your life.
Do you have any instances of senior actors taking you under their wing on set?
I was so, so lucky when I joined the first To All the Boys movie and at such a pivotal point in my early teenage hood. I was going into grade nine. It was the summer of prime awkwardness, of figuring out … this is scary and people at school are changing and what it means to be 14 is so complicated. During that summer I had Lana [Condor] and Janel [Parrish] and Madeline [Arthur] and the whole cast of To All the Boys as a whole group of big siblings. I was just telling my mom this yesterday actually that when I look back on that summer, I can see how formative that was.
XO, Kitty is set in Seoul and you guys shoot in Seoul. What has your experience been like living there? What are some of your favorite things to do there?
It was so fun to get to re-explore Seoul out of COVID this time, and there was a lot of things that we wanted to do in season one but couldn’t and got the chance to now, so that was so much fun. It was familiar but also brand new. Something that really stands out to me is we went to a baseball game with a bunch of the cast and a whole bunch of the crew. There were 65 of us that all went together and that was so much fun. It was a last-minute thing that I was trying to organize on a Friday night of our shooting week and I was like, “Guys, what if we all together go to a baseball game tomorrow?” That honestly was a core memory of shooting.
What do you do to recharge when you’re feeling busy with work? Being someone in your twenties, I think a lot of the time things can feel very daunting and overwhelming, so what do you do to take a step back and have a moment for yourself?
I am going to university right now, or actually just finished my semester a few days ago, and I’m still coming down from the stress of finals. I guess that takes up most of my time when I’m not working, and I love school so much. I feel very lucky that I’ve gotten the chance to still follow both passions. In high school, I was working and going to school consistently and learned how to have a balance of two different worlds. Then after I graduated, I shot season one [of XO, Kitty], and I took a little bit of a gap from school and then I went back to university when I came home.
It has just been so, so beneficial in so many ways because one, the actual act of being a student and getting to learn and do things that I’m passionate about has been amazing. But also, just getting to exist in a space that isn’t work. It’s kind of like a different side of my brain and a different part of me that I get to really sit in and explore. I’ve loved that. And I think just learning how to be an adult and learning how to be your own person. Being actors is a really weird profession — you’re in a lot of unusual settings and I feel like not necessarily traditional, normal standard work environments or even your coworkers. I grew up with so many people who are not my age and friends of people who are not in the same stage of my life. Now getting to be in college with a bunch of people who are all at the same stage, we’re all exploring things, we’re all chaotic, we’re all figuring it out, we’re all overtired.
Did you find it difficult acclimating to this school environment?
I definitely think the learning process, figuring out how to make that all work and what’s the healthiest for me, is definitely a continuous journey. I was lucky that when I started in my first year, it was before the show came out. Lots of people had seen the movies, but it [had] kind of died down. During my first year, it wasn’t too overwhelming, and I was lucky to find a really, really good community. … I will say that after season one came out, it definitely did change some things. I was really overwhelmed in those first few weeks of figuring out what does that look like, what does that mean if I’m being perceived as my work self and people know me as Anna from XO, Kitty? But I’m also trying to be the girl from a group project, and I need to peer review with you on an assignment. Figuring that out definitely has its challenges for sure.
How do you want people to perceive you in your career and in your life?
It’s something that I think about a lot and get really in my head about. I was joking to my friends before I left for this crazy next month, the next few weeks is going to be a lot of press. And I was like, “I’m not ready to be perceived this much.” You’re constantly self-reflecting on yourself and making sure people have the impression that you want them to have and all of that. I think authenticity is something that’s been important to me since I was little and since the start of my career. … And I’ve always had a very strong sense of self and very strong opinions on things that feel right or don’t feel right.
On a very big scale, I hope people see that I care so much. I care so much about everything honestly. Sometimes I wish I cared a little bit less. I think that’s a very overarching theme that comes up in my life a lot, which I honestly relate to Kitty in that way a lot as well. I just care so much. … My hope is that everybody feels loved and seen and safe and appreciated. If I can have any part in doing that for anybody within my career or in my own personal life, nothing is more important to me. And then also the same thing for myself of getting to feel loved and appreciated and seen and heard, and having spaces to find out what it means to be Anna and what it means to be myself is such a prominent thing.
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