Anna Cathcart Is Ready to Take the Lead (2024)

It’s Anna Cathcart’s turn now. More than four years after originating the role of Katherine “Kitty” Song Covey—the meddling, matchmaking younger sister of protagonist Lara Jean (Lana Condor)—in the To All the Boys film trilogy, Cathcart has reprised the fan-favorite character in XO, Kitty, a new 10-episode spin-off series that premiered Thursday on Netflix.

In it, Kitty, now a junior in high school, moves from Portland, Oregon, to the South Korean capital of Seoul to reconnect with her long-distance boyfriend, Dae (Minyeong Choi), and attend the Korean Independent School of Seoul (KISS), where she quickly discovers that relationships are a lot more complicated when you have to put your own heart on the line.

“Something that is so prominent in the movies is that Kitty is very, very confident. She’s very sassy and feels like she knows the answer all the time,” Cathcart, now 19, tells Bazaar.com on a recent video call from Los Angeles, where she has spent the last couple of weeks doing a media blitz after finishing her freshman year at the University of British Columbia. “And for the first time, we’re seeing her in this series not being so sure of herself and not feeling like she’s got it all figured out … and that’s what growing up looks like.”

Below, Cathcart opens up about the experience of revisiting Kitty (which she likens to catching up with an old friend), the advice she received from former costars Lana Condor and Noah Centineo as the new lead of the TATB franchise, and the bevy of cliffhangers that will leave viewers fervently awaiting a potential second season.

When I spoke with Lana Condor last summer, she said she had given you some advice during preproduction about conserving your energy and speaking up for yourself as the first-time lead of a major project. What did you learn from her about what it means to set the tone on set as No. 1 on the call sheet?

I was so lucky that I had her and Janel [Parrish, who played the oldest Song Covey sister, Margot] to turn to and have them as role models for the last few years since the movies, especially at this point where I was having the opportunity to go into a new position and new experience. I feel like standing up for yourself and knowing what you need and what is necessary is something important and can easily get lost. [The experience] is very overwhelming and exciting, but it’s easy to get tied up in it, and [it’s important] to remember what you need, like to advocate for your rest and your needs.

Also, it’s teamwork. It’s not like you’re the team captain, and everyone else is not at the same level as you. You’re very much in it together, and I am nothing without my cast, and we are all there for each other. We were all equals. I think that that was something that was really important to me off the top—making sure everyone felt included and valued and loved, because I felt so supported by all of them. Looking back, that would’ve been such a completely different chapter for me if I didn’t have them to turn to.

I saw you also reunited with Noah Centineo at the premiere last week. Did he offer you any words of wisdom during production?

He was so sweet. He had texted me a while ago, when I was in Korea, to say congratulations and that he was proud of me, and that he knows it can be really overwhelming sometimes, but that I got this. It honestly did mean a lot to hear that from people whom I’ve looked up to for so many years [not only] as actors, but also as human beings. Seeing him just the other day at the premiere was such a surprise and such a great reunion. It felt like my heart was exploding. [Laughs.]

The great thing about this series is that it doesn’t negate any of the worldbuilding that Lana and Noah helped establish in the films; it simply expands the universe in a different part of the world. How did you establish camaraderie with this new cast when most of you were uprooting your lives to live in Korea for four months?

Something that I found was always interesting were the parallels [between] my life and Kitty’s life. I was like, “I am kind of going to international school too. I’m taking this big leap into a brand-new chapter of my life and moving across the world, being away from family, and learning how to be independent.” … But I was lucky that the bond with this cast was pretty immediate. Some of them were locals and had lived in Korea most of their lives. Other people were from all over—we have people from Australia, someone from France, and different people from different places in America. I think the diversity in our friend group helped a lot. Diversity is a very important theme in the show, but we also valued it as people and as friends. One of the first days we hung out, we went to karaoke and went bowling, and by the end of the night we were like, “How did we just meet?! I feel like we’ve been friends for years.” And I can tell you that is not always the case.

It’s easy to conflate actors with the characters they play, but in your case, you were exploring South Korea at the same time Kitty was.

I think some of the best memories from shooting and being in Korea are those little small moments that you later realize are not small at all, like going to get fried chicken late at night with the cast and hanging out and playing board games in someone’s room until three in the morning. Those little things are what make the experience in the end.

We were based in Seoul, but we would drive three hours out and stay there for a few days or just shoot in different neighborhoods. Of course, there’s still so much of Korea that I haven’t explored and that I really want to see, but by the end of it, I felt like I could get the sense of being a local, getting to live somewhere and not just be a tourist for a few days. I went to Seoul when I was shooting the third movie, as the rest of the cast did, but it was for two weeks. But this time, I was like, “Oh, we got to know grocery stores and the subway system,” and that’s really special.

Although it feels very much like an American teen show, XO, Kitty is packed with soapy plot twists that are reminiscent of K-dramas. For instance, Kitty unwittingly finds herself potentially having feelings for three different classmates by the end of the season. What was your reaction to the way showrunners Jenny Han and Sascha Rothchild decided to end the finale?

It was honestly changed a few times. As a cast, we were reading what the finale was gonna be when we were doing other previous episodes, so [we were] on the edge of our own seats. I love the cliffhanger with Min Ho [Sang Heon Lee] at the very end, and I personally feel like enemies-to-lovers is always a great trope to watch. I know that it was very unexpected for Kitty, and it was for me as well. It was very cute, and I’m just a big fan of that scene.

But in general, I love how at the very end, Kitty does not have it all figured out. When you’re growing up, that’s something that, at least for me, can feel very prominent and very overwhelming: Other people have it figured out, and I need to find myself and get there. It’s not as easy as that, and sometimes that realization can feel scary. I love that at the end, Kitty doesn’t know who she is, or what the next day is gonna look like, but knows that she grew. She came here to learn about her mom and about herself, and both of those things definitely happened, so she can still feel really fulfilled and proud when she gets on that plane.

Let’s break down the three people Kitty is thinking about at the end of the season. First, there’s Min Ho, who confesses his feelings to her on the plane to Los Angeles. What do you think was the turning point in that relationship?

I think it is that classic trope of having that tension off the top of not liking each other, which can very quickly turn into a different type of tension, which is basically what happens. I think in episode 5 when they’re creating their Chuseok party together and they’re bonding in a new way where they’re one-on-one, Kitty is like, “Oh my God, you actually are a real person, and you are nice sometimes.” She's starting to see him as a real human who has a personality; she can see where he is coming from and understand his background a little more, which explains his behavior. [But dating him] doesn’t really cross Kitty’s mind until that last scene where she’s like [high-pitched], “Oh my God, what the heck is happening?!” Min Ho is not wanting to necessarily feel that way, which I think is shown with that dream sequence when he wakes up freaking out and then freaks out the rest of the episode.

Episode 8 shifts Kitty and Yuri’s (Gia Kim) relationship, in the sense that Kitty finds out Yuri was dating Kitty’s boyfriend, Dae, to cover up the fact that she was gay and in love with a girl who was kicked out of KISS. How do those conversations make Kitty begin to wonder about her own attraction to Yuri?

Kitty didn’t know that Yuri could ever even be remotely interested, and then at that moment when she finds out her truth, [Kitty] is like, “Oh my God, so it is possible …” So it’s definitely a bomb dropped on Kitty’s brain. And then by the end of that episode, she’s feeling great about Dae because they’re finally back together. But when she sees [Yuri] talk to Juliana, she’s realizing, “Why do I not feel okay about this? What’s happening here?” This is not something that Kitty is trying to do. She wants to be with Dae; she wants it to be perfect the way that she planned it at the start of this trip. But feelings are not something you can control.

[Kitty] has that line [to Yuri] where she’s like, “You were someone that I pitied, and you were someone I hated last week, and now I relate to you because you care so much about love, and you’re doing this because you love somebody. I get love. I know love. That’s my thing.” So it’s definitely a big shift in the relationship, and the view that she has of Yuri completely changes.

Last but not least, we have Dae, whom Kitty describes as her first love. What did you want to convey in that final breakup scene to show the progression of Kitty and Dae’s relationship and why they might not be as well suited for each other as either of them may have thought?

That scene was a very special one. That day felt so different. Minyeong and I talked about how important that scene felt to the story. Something that I agree with is the message that even if something is not right anymore, it doesn’t take away from how special it was at the time. I think that’s definitely what Kitty’s trying to tell Dae: “You will always be the perfect first boyfriend, and you’re always gonna be the first boy that I ever loved. That doesn’t change even if now we’re not together.”

I think Kitty is going through a lot, and she just needs to give herself time to focus on her relationship with herself, and that’s definitely a driving factor for why she wants to break up. She doesn’t want to hurt anybody in the process, and she knows that it might hurt Dae in the long run if she’s going through these feelings, so it’s definitely for the best [right now].

What would you like to explore ideally with Kitty going forward, assuming she’s able to return to KISS in some way in a hypothetical second season?

I hope Kitty continues to be kind to herself and give herself as much space as possible to make mistakes and understand that you don’t need to be so hard on yourself. I love the scene in the last episode where she talks to her dad, and her dad’s saying, “You are really strong.” And she’s like, “I don’t feel very strong.” And he’s like, “But you are. Sometimes, those are the moments where you don’t feel it, but that is you being courageous and being brave.”

Everyone’s experience growing up is different, but at the root of it, we all feel lost at times, we all feel confused. I think the show does a great job showing that no matter what family you come from, or where in the world you live, those core themes are something we can all relate to. So if Kitty continues to do that, I will fully support her story, and I hope she continues to follow her own heart and not get pushed into doing something that she doesn’t feel is right for her.

This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.