Anna Cathcart gets own Netflix spin-off, XO, Kitty

Anna Cathcart was just 14 years old when she was cast as youngest sibling Kitty Song Covey in the To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before film trilogy.

“I truly had no idea how much (Kitty) was going to change my life,” she recently told the Netflix site, Tudum.

“I had just turned 14 and at the time I was auditioning for a one-off little romance movie (that I absolutely loved).

“I was ecstatic, but so unaware of the incredible universe that I was about to enter.”

Fast forward five years, three movies and one adolescence, and Cathcart is now starring front and centre in her own spin-off, XO Kitty, which hits Netflix this week.

Written by the film’s writer Jenny Han (Han also wrote the book series the films are based on), it sees 16-year-old Kitty heading to Seoul, Korea on a scholarship to her mum’s old school, Korean Independent School of Seoul.

While there she hopes to make contact with her long-distance Korean boyfriend, Dae (Minyeong Choi). And, well, things don’t go according to plan.

Although the series expands on the much-loved universe first explored in Han’s books, the good news is you don’t need to have dipped into them first to be able to enjoy this sweet coming-of-age story.

“It is definitely its own thing,” Cathcart says. “You could enter into this story just starting with XO, Kitty and be on Kitty’s journey as if you’re meeting her for the first time.

“She’s the big fish in a small pond, (and) she thinks she knows it all in Portland. Then she has a rude awakening when she’s put in a new place like Seoul. That’s very relatable and universal.”

Cathcart says she found many similarities to her own life in Kitty’s story.

“I’m kind of doing the same thing in my own life,” the 19-year-old, who recently moved out of the home she shared with her parents, told Teen Vogue.

“I’m going far away from home, meeting brand-new people, and doing something that’s intimidating that I haven’t done in this way before.

“I’m also in this stage of growing up and (gaining) independence.”

XO, Kitty begins streaming on Thursday May 18 on Netflix.