XO, Kitty is the first of its kind! A spinoff from To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, the Netflix series follows Anna Cathcart‘s character Kitty after she transfers to KISS University in South Korea to reunite with her long-distance boyfriend. The entire show was filmed in South Korea with a Korean production crew, something that’s never been done before for an American series.
At XO, Kitty’s L.A. premiere on May 11, 2023, the cast exclusively revealed to J-14 what it was like to film in South Korea, experiencing culture shock and more.
‘XO, Kitty’ Cast on Filming In South Korea and Culture Shock
Along with Anna, the cast of XO, Kitty includes Choi Min-yeong as Dae, Anthony Keyvan as Q, and newcomers Gia Kim as Yuri, Sang Heon Lee as Min Ho, Peter Thurnwald as Alex, Jocelyn Shelfo as Madison and Regan Aliyah as Juliana.
“From the moment I landed in the airport and saw other Korean people walking around, I was just like, ‘Oh, I don’t know what’s going on,'” Peter told J-14 exclusively, adding that the language barrier in itself was pretty hard to get used to. “People would come up to me and speak Korean, and I would be like, ‘hi,’ and then I’d point to Min-yeong, and be like, ‘Just talk to him,’ so it was a pretty big culture shock.”
Anthony, who plays Q, expressed similar sentiments as his costar, adding that the experience was “amazing” and “transformative.”
“I feel like all of us learned so much during the course of this production,” he gushed. “It’s really cool to see how everyone came together with a collective goal to make an amazing show regardless of the language barrier — because our entire crew is Korean. So it was so interesting to see how an American crew and a Korean crew could act with each other.”
Regan added that the food in South Korea was a big highlight for her. “The food out there’s amazing,” she said. “The people out there are super, super sweet. It’s a really safe place to be, so we were just walking down the streets having fun in the middle of the night, and it’s like, ‘This is crazy. We can do this?'”
Sang Heon Lee, Minyeong Choi, Gia Kim, Anna Cathcart, Jocelyn Shelfo, Regan Aliyah, Anthony Keyvan and Peter Thurnwald arrive at the Los Angeles Premiere Event Of Netflix’s ‘XO, Kitty’ Season 1 held at the Netflix Tudum Theater on May 11, 2023 in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, United States.
Los Angeles Premiere Event Of Netflix’s ‘XO, Kitty’ Season 1, Netflix Tudum Theater, Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, United States – 11 May 2023 Shutterstock
Did the Cast of ‘XO, Kitty’ Get Close IRL?
No need to worry if the cast of XO, Kitty got close or not — you can see that from the amount of photos and videos they post of one another via social media.
“The hotel we stayed in was beautiful, and having dinners with the cast and making food and just having a good time together, it’s one of those things where that’s a one in a million [experience], and the fact that we all got it together is incredible,” Regan enthused. “I had an amazing time, honestly.”
Jocelyn, who also appeared in another Jenny Han series, The Summer I Turned Pretty, explained that while COVID-19 was still “pretty bad” when they got to South Korea and they couldn’t do “a lot,” so it was a way for the cast to get even closer.
“We would hang a lot with each other, obviously,” she said, before adding that they did a lot of activities like karaoke, bouldering and rock climbing.
“Sang Heon would always make us breakfast,” she revealed. “He would text us in the morning and be like, ‘It’s tea time.’ We would come, we’d all go to his room, and he’d make us tea, and we’d eat breakfast and stuff before we started our day.” Cute!
Love J-14? Be sure to subscribe to our YouTube channel for fun, exclusive videos with your favorite stars.
