Anna Lambe stars as Siaja in North of North. All episodes of the first season are now streaming on Netflix. We talked about how authenticity was front and center for this project, filming in her hometown, the visceral experience of watching the series, tackling difficult topics with humor, and taking risks.

A young Inuk woman wants to build a new future for herself after a spontaneous — and extremely public — exit from her marriage. But it won’t be easy in a small Arctic town where everybody knows your business.

“I think from the moment that I read the scripts, the authenticity was front and center. I read it, and being from the North, I was like, ‘Yup, that’s real. I definitely know a few people like that,’” the actress expressed to me. “The show was created by Stacey Aglok MacDonald and Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, and they are women from the North. Alethea is from Iqaluit, and Stacey is from the Western region, a place called Kugluktuk, and the story is so reflective of their experiences as Inuit women that have lived in the North and have tried to navigate wanting something for yourself, but also the expectations of your community and how challenging that is. And so, when we were telling the story and creating it, it was such a wonderful thing to have so much trust, to feel like it’s so real, and to just fall into something. The trust that they had for me to build Siaja and working in collaboration to tell her story was such a wonderful thing.”

She continued to share, “[Representing Nunavut and Inuit] is a big responsibility, and being able to show the kind of complexities of our community and the importance of that is a lot on the shoulders. But I think the fact that we carry it amongst us, as well as with Maika Harper, who’s also from Iqaluit, she plays Neevee, and with Zorga Qaunaq, who plays Millie, she’s from Igloolik, which is another Northern community, we were able to share that load and, I think, lean into one another to tell this story, which was so special.”

Watch my interview below: