Kate Del Castillo on the Return of 'La Reina Del Sur'

Kate Del Castillo shared some exciting news with People CHICA: La Reina del Sur three is happening. New episodes of the series will begin filming early next year. “It’s changed a lot of women’s lives in many ways," says Del Castillo. "[Teresa] is an iconic character because she is a very resilient woman. She’s so flawed. That’s what I love about Teresa, because she’s not the typical heroine. She is actually an anti-heroine! That’s why a lot of women really relate to her, because she’s flawed and because she’s real. She is living a life that she didn’t choose to live, but she confronts this life. She comes back every time stronger and stronger.”

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The Mexican actress — who also plays a cartel queen in the film Bad Boys for Life — says the third season will focus less on the drug trade and more on the action-packed aspects of Teresa's life. “This time I want to stay a little bit away from the drugs and all that because it’s not about that," she explains. "She is not defined by the drug trafficking. She is an amazing, iconic woman, so now it’s going to be more of a thriller action series, which I love. There is going to be drama, of course, and romance, but I love action.”

(Edgar Negrete/ Clasos.com/LatinContent via Getty Images)

The second season ended with a bang, with strangers coming in helicopters and boats to find Teresa and the audience not knowing if they were friends or foes. Del Castillo says viewers will see the powerful evolution of La Reina in the new storyline. “She is now a different woman because she has a kid and now [her daughter] is with her," she says. "The good thing is Arturo Pérez-Reverte, the original author [of the novel], has been with us through now the third season. It’s going to be an amazing story."

(Edgar Negrete/ Clasos.com/LatinContent via Getty Images)

How will they film in the age of coronavirus? “I have no idea!" Del Castillo says. "I think nobody knows. We’re going to follow every single protocol, of course. La Reina Del Sur’s second season went to eight different countries. Now we want to still travel, but we have to do it safely. It’s going to be a huge production. We’ll figure it out."

The actress says she stays optimistic despite the pandemic and current world news. “I have to because I have so much love for my parents who are in Mexico. I have my friends and I have a job. I have to tell myself every single day, ‘You have to get out of bed,’ because I have no kids or no husband to wake me up and tell me," she says. "So it’s only me, and because I’m my favorite person, I have to do it for me. I just stay positive because I’m doing whatever it is that I love, which is my career. I also read and try to do different things and I never get bored. I’m not afraid of being by myself.”

She has stayed active on social media, sharing a post about the murder of soldier Vanessa Guillen. “I don’t even have the words, it just affects me,” she says about Guillen's violent death. “Not only her, but every single story that I hear. Almost every single day something new happens. We are so flawed as humanity and I just feel sad. Something has to happen and somebody has to make us feel that we are doing something really wrong as humanity. My prayers are with her family.”

She has also been impacted by the Black Lives Matter protests against police brutality.“I have good days and I have bad days, like everybody else I guess," she says. "All these lives taken by the police have affected me a lot, and everybody else who has a heart. That, plus the pandemic — this uncertainty which gives you this fear that we don’t know what’s going to happen or when or how. If you feel sad one day, that’s fine. Just embrace it and stay in your bed if you want to and have some ice cream. That’s good, but for one day. Get out of your bed the next day and call your loved ones, Zoom with them. Know that you’re not alone and everybody in the world is going through this."