Melissa Barrera and I go way back, but not in the traditional way. We\u2019d never met before our Zoom interview, but we were both born and raised in Monterrey, Mexico, and attended the same school. She was seven years ahead of me, but when I was in elementary school, I saw her in a couple of our school\u2019s musical productions: as Rizzo in Grease and Amneris in Aida. She really was always meant to be an actor; it was clear even then.<\/p>\n
\u201cDo we know each other?\u201d she says, in Spanish, after joining the call. \u201cI recognize your name.\u201d But we aren\u2019t meeting to talk about those early years in northern Mexico, where she discovered her passion for musical theater. We\u2019re here to talk about Barrera\u2019s latest project, The Copenhagen Test, an espionage thriller coming to Peacock on December 27. A departure from last year\u2019s horror-comedy Abigail, in which she starred with Dan Stevens and the late Angus Cloud, and the delightful Your Monster, with Tommy Dewey and Meghann Fahy, the series marks her first return to the small screen since she led Netflix\u2019s survival drama Keep Breathing in 2022.<\/p>\n
In August of last year, Barrera got the script for the first two episodes of an untitled Simu Liu\u2013James Wan project (both are executive producers), which she thought was well written. \u201cI was at a time in my life where I knew I wanted to get back to work on something challenging but also something that was going to be fun for me,\u201d she tells me from an apartment in Barcelona. \u201cThis checked all the boxes.\u201d<\/p>\n