At 14, Anna Cathcart Was Thriving On To All The Boys

Those early teen years can have their ups and downs, but Anna Cathcart doesn’t mind admitting that life at 14 was actually... great.

“I was honestly kind of thriving,” the 22-year-old actor tells Bustle over Zoom.

A week after she celebrated her birthday in the summer of 2017, she began shooting To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before in her hometown of Vancouver. The film, in which she played the precocious little sister Kitty Song Covey, would prove formative for a generation of romance viewers, spawning the Jenny Han Cinematic Universe as we know it. Surrounded by role models — including her onscreen big sisters Lana Condor and Janel Parrish — Cathcart was living her own YA-coded season of discovery.

“It was the first summer I started wearing mascara, and I started taking Instagram pictures, and teenage traits started flooding in,” she says. “[I was like], Oh, I don’t want to be a kid anymore. I want to figure this out.”

Cathcart bookended the year on the set of Disney Channel’s Descendants 3, working with High School Musical director Kenny Ortega — its own kind of “dream come true,” she says, after watching Troy Bolton belt it out on the basketball court “raised me to want to be an actor.”

Though she was already an established talent on the kids’ educational comedy Odd Squad, for which she’d earn a Canadian Screen Award, age 14 was when Cathcart started to realize her own momentum as a performer. “I was like, Maybe I could keep doing this. Maybe there is a path.”

Indeed, she’s charted quite the course. Since 2023, Cathcart has starred on the To All the Boys spin-off XO, Kitty, where she’s stepped into her own as a self-assured teen navigating her own coming-of-age at school in Seoul. In Season 3 (streaming now on Netflix), Kitty’s focused on having a memorable senior year while pondering her future beyond the dreamy KISS campus.

She’s also embracing all that comes next, while still recognizing the pinch-me moments that got her here. “I was just so awestruck to be doing everything. Every red carpet was fun, every photo was like, Oh my God, I can’t believe I look like a famous person,” she says.

Cathcart regularly honors that exuberant inner child. Recently, she shared a throwback picture of herself walking the Dolby Theatre steps in jeans in 2017 as a tourist, nearly a decade before attending this year’s Oscars as a guest.

“She’s freaking out! Like, you need to do this for her,” she says, imagining her younger self. “Sure, your job can be complicated and difficult at moments. But there’s literally nothing else I would want to be doing, even now. This is such a dream of hers. You need to do it for her — not anyone else.”

Below, Cathcart revisits drama class, her first crush, and what she’d tell 14-year-old Anna today.

You’ve attended school throughout your entire acting career. Were there challenges in becoming a little more public?

It definitely was a weird time. I made it through all of high school without ever being invited to a party. I was so not part of the popular kids, but I felt like everybody knew me, like, “She’s the actor girl.”

I have so many distinct memories of older boys yelling my character name down the hall or being like, “Dizzy, will you sign my T-shirt?” Looking back now, it’s so funny because I had a full-blown career! You were a stupid 16-year-old boy. What gave you the right to make me feel bad about what I was doing?

You mentioned turning 14 right before filming To All the Boys. Is there anything you learned from your time on set that really informed you later on?

I saw the cast use their voices in such powerful and respectful ways. When you are young, you feel like, Oh, I have to say yes to everything. Learning that you’re allowed to use your voice [to] rest and take care of yourself is so important, especially in a job [where work] can snowball really quickly.

My mom was on set all the time. I could only work 10 hours. And then when I did turn 18, and that was the same time [I started] Season 1 of XO, Kitty, it was like, Whoa, I have to relearn my job. I’ve never done it with demands and expectations. I remember telling Lana after Season 1, “I get it.” I remember there were so many times when she was tired; I was a perky, endless-energy 14-year-old, like, “This is the best thing ever! This isn’t even a job!”

And you reunite with Lana this season! Did that bring new takeaways?

Totally. Hearing how the three movies were for her, similar to how the three seasons were for me, I was like, Oh, that’s not just me going through that. You also felt this pressure or anxiety. Lana’s known me for so long, and that creates an immediate intimacy and closeness that you can’t replicate. I’m very grateful for all of her support.

To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before set a new standard for what a YA rom-com could be. Were you into romance as a 14-year-old?

Up until then, I was like, “Boys are disgusting. I don’t understand why my classmates want a boyfriend — like, we’re children.” Slowly that summer, I had my first real crush on this guy that I’m still friends with now, which is so funny.

I remember talking to Lana and Noah [Centineo] about it — Noah being like, “Show me his Instagram,” and Lana being like, “He would be an idiot to not like you back.” I remember so clearly being almost embarrassed to admit that I like someone. He didn’t like me back. I was so sad. The first person I texted was Lana, and I was like, “It’s not happening.” She was like, “No! No way, I’m shocked.” I had dinner with her, yapped about everything.

What would you tell 14-year-old Anna today?

So many of the things that feel so out of reach and that she hopes she can become, she’ll get to become. Throughout my entire life, I’ve had anxiety, but I manage it in a way that I as a teenager never thought I would be able to. Hopefully, we’re only getting better and are on a positive trajectory. There are so many people in your life that you are going to love so much, and who are going to love you, that you don’t even know exist yet.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.