Ritu Arya Opens Up About Enjoyable Arguments With Umbrella Academy Co-Star David Castaneda In Front of the Camera
The Umbrella Academy stars Ritu Arya and David Castaneda share a playful banter offscreen despite the tense moments the duo’s characters had to live through in the latest installment of the show. Speaking to PEOPLE magazine, Arya, who plays the role of Lila, shared her experience with David, her favorite moments with the latter’s character Diego, and her interpretations of the romance that left the audience shocked.
“It’s super easy working with David,” Arya tells PEOPLE, “We’ve been doing this for a while now, so [it was] a lot of fun actually getting to just let loose and play this new dynamic.” The soured relationship between Lila and Diego led to a lot of bickering, but for Arya, these were the best scenes to enact. Castaneda said something along similar lines when he talked to the outlet ahead of the Season 4 premiere. “Wherever I run she runs, and wherever she runs, I run, every time we work together,” said the star, drawing a parallel between working with Lila and putting on an old shoe, which indicates comfort in familiarity.
Undeniably, the biggest shocker that came to fans was the romance between Lila and Diego’s brother Five. Plagued by differences in marriage, Diego and Lila’s lives are completely altered as the latter slips into a different timeline with Five. Away into a new timeline with almost negligible hopes of making a return, Five and Lila begin an intimate relationship that lasts for 7 years until they make it back home, after which they go on their separate ways. Fans and viewers have been rallying on social media platforms, complaining about how this plotline does not add up when taking into account the events of the previous seasons.
Arya herself was quite shocked when she read this plot twist. “A writer had accidentally told me that that was going to happen the year before, and I just assumed that it was a joke,” she notes as she quickly realizes that the script is quite real. The star was then asked how she sees her character’s arc as the fourth season has concluded. For Arya, Lily’s primary motivation has always been her children.
“That’s what she was living for—just to come back and see her kids. When she does, I think it sort of throws a spanner in the works when she sees Diego,” she says on the romantic fallout between the two characters. “I don’t think she’s expecting to have feelings for him again.
As the stars bid goodbye to their beloved on-screen personas and co-stars, Arya calls the cast and crew her “family,” something she cannot take for granted.
ALSO READ: ‘Definitely Bittersweet’: The Umbrella Academy Cast Reunite At Fourth And Final Season Premiere