Maia Reficco Talks The Last Sunrise, Facing Fears, Debut Music EP

Don’t even ask Maia Reficco about Plan B, because that was never an option. She’s been too busy making Plan A a reality.

That’s partly because she “came out of the womb singing,” the 26-year-old actress quips during a recent chat with The Hollywood Reporter. “I just have literally never shut up. I’ve always sung since the second I was born. And my first word was my godfather’s name, who is a piano player, and he taught me how to play the piano.”

After moving from the U.S. to Argentina as a child, it was only a matter of time before Reficco figured out how to turn her dreams of singing and acting into a tangible career. She eventually got her start as a teen on the Nickelodeon Latin America series Kally’s Mashup, but it was her breakout role as Noa Olivar in Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin that launched her to new heights.

“I’ll forever be so grateful for that because it opened the doors for me to essentially have a career here in the U.S. and in a space where I never thought I’d be able to break through,” she says of the spinoff that ran for two seasons, from 2022-2024.

Reficco jokes that her Pretty Little Liars experience was “a bit like acting bootcamp,” which only prepared her for what’s to come — her first starring role in a romance film.

She’s playing Ry in the Prime Video adaptation of author Anna Todd’s bestseller The Last Sunrise, which releases on Aug. 26. The script really had Reficco “kicking my feet, giggling,” she admits, but the whole experience also touched on something much deeper for the actress.

“There was something about being so connected to the femininity within this role and within this story that made me feel good about myself,” she says of the coming-of-age romance. “And that helped me overcome a lot of my preconceived notions of how I would feel in a movie where it explicitly in the script requires me to be hot or stuff like that.”

Though Reficco has been having an onscreen moment the last few years, she’s never forgotten the “reason I was brought into the world,” which was music, she says. It took her some time, but she’s finally ready to let the world into her vulnerable side with the upcoming release of her debut EP.

“I’m terrified for people to know so much about my vulnerabilities because I’ve always been a very private person,” she tells THR. “That being said, it’s the music I love. And so I’m going to release it into the world and hopefully people can connect with it.”

Below, Reficco gets candid about her favorite moments from filming The Last Sunrise, the truth behind awkward chemistry reads, if she’s open to reprising her character Ry, what fans can expect from her new music and more.

With The Last Sunrise, how much did you lean into the script vs. the book material when developing your character Ry?

With book adaptations, it’s always such a fine line between honoring the pages and wanting to bring that character that’s so beloved by anyone who’s read the book to life, but at the same time creating something of our own with the team that we made the film with. So I definitely think it helped having Anna Todd as a producer, because she obviously informed the decisions that we were making alongside Carlson Young, our director. And me as an actor, between all of us and having the source material and at the same time having our script, I think that’s where all the intersection happened of trying to find where we would honor the page heavily and where we would try and find room to play and create this new version of Ry. But it’s always such a fun challenge.

Do you have a favorite moment on set while you were filming?  

I think it was maybe the top two shoots of my life. It really was very special. Fernando [Lindez] and I became really close through getting to explore the island [of Mallorca], so definitely going to hidden beaches all over with him. And we went out a lot. We went out and had fun.

I would say a favorite memory of mine is actually on the first Sunday that Fernando and I … we met for the camera read, but then when he got to New York, I was there already. And it took us a couple of days to actually get along, funny enough. We weren’t really vibing. And then on a Saturday, we went to this party together and we were like, “Yo, you rock. No, you rock.” And from then on, we became best friends. And the next day we hung out, had lunch and went to this random beach that was an hour away, and we did this whole ordeal. And I think that’s what really bonded us.

Did you and Lindez have a chemistry read prior to being cast and shooting?

I flew to Madrid a month out of shooting to read with a bunch of guys. And it was so funny because chem reads are always goofy. And I’d not done one in person in a while. … It was goofy because it was all these kissing scenes and stuff. And it was a parade of all these attractive men being all Spanish, big and er. I was just like, “What’s going on?” (Laughs.)

Anna Todd is also looking to turn the book into a trilogy, so if Prime Video decides to adapt those, would you be open to reprising your character? 

I have been trying to put pressure on Prime [Video] every interview I do. I’m like, “Let’s make the second one. Come on, let’s get to it.” I really would love to make a second one. We had so much fun during the first one. I would love to go back to New York. I would love to go back to shooting with Eva [Longoria] and with [Fernando]. I think it was all around pretty perfect as an experience.

Looking back, what did you take away from your experience on Pretty Little Liars: Original Sin and joining a spinoff of such a beloved show?

Pretty Little Liars was life-changing for me. I loved that show and I loved making it, and I’m forever grateful to Lindsay [Calhoon Bring] and Roberto [Aguirre-Sacasa], our showrunners, for giving me that opportunity. It was my first big job in the U.S. …. And I’ll forever be so grateful for that because it opened the doors for me to essentially have a career here in the U.S. and in a space where I never thought I’d be able to break through.

That being said, I was able to meet some of my favorite people in the world, truly the girls I absolutely adore, and I feel so lucky to still be friends with all of them. … I just feel really lucky that I was able to do something I loved and to be part of such a beloved IP. I loved Pretty Little Liars. Lucy Hale was one of the first girls I ever had a crush on. And I was like, wait, maybe I’m a little gayyyy (Laughs). …. It was super campy. It was so silly. And it was a bit like acting bootcamp.

Having been born in the U.S. but growing up in Argentina, how do you feel that shaped the person who’ve grown into today who’s continuing to expand in their career?

Everything that I am is incredibly intertwined with the fact that I am a woman and the fact that I’m Argentine. So everything I am and do and feel and say and create is always going to be completely informed by these two things. … That being said, when I act and when I choose what stories to tell, it’s always from this perspective of my lived experience. So whether it is a PLL where I really fought for certain things about Noa’s identity or whether it’s a Hadestown where I asked if I could speak in Spanish and they were so eager about it. And I was speaking in Spanish in my favorite show on Broadway.

I always feel really proud to say where I am from and to drink my mate [an Argentine drink] every day and to loudly say that I’m Argentine, because I know I come from a country that, while it’s a third-world country and we have our struggles, we are so kind and we are incredibly welcoming.

You’re also going to be releasing your debut EP in August. How did you know now felt like the right time to return to music?

Hand on my heart, I think the reason I was brought into the world is to sing. There’s nothing I love more and nothing makes me feel more aligned with who I am as a person. And there’s been a wide plethora of reasons why I’ve not poured myself entirely into music yet. Some of them stemming from an identity crisis, to be completely frank, and others from logistical, practical, professional things that made it a little complicated to move forward. But that being said, I do think the timing of it is perfect, and I do believe in everything happens for a reason. And I definitely think this had to happen in the moment that it’s happening because I needed to grow a lot in order to finally face something I care about so deeply.

So now having my first song out, “Amapola,” being a song I love so dearly and being fun and not being too in my head and not being pretentious and trying to fall into the love I have for music alongside a visual world that I worked really hard to curate, I feel really lucky to be able to finally do this.

Did you have a specific sound and vibe that you were aiming for with your debut EP?

It’s a combination of a lot of influences I love while still being true to my own identity. Pop music is wonderful and great and sexy and fun and sad and devastating all in one. So I try to mix a pop approach to songwriting and a pop approach to certain production elements while still keeping an alternative twist on them, for lack of a better word. Sonically, especially with the latest stuff I’ve been doing, which is not in my first EP, I’ve really been gravitating towards a bit more of an alternative sound. But for the first EP, I wanted it to feel like six different worlds within the universe that I am as an artist and as a human.

What’s something you absolutely cannot live without?

My mate and my nebulizer. Literally these two. If you’re a singer, get yourself a portable nebulizer. It’s great. And my mate is [because] I’m Argentine. All I do is drink that (Laughs).

What might be surprising that fans don’t know about you?

I speak Italian. My favorite thing in the world is [Argentine soccer player Lionel] Messi and I’m really proud to be Argentine. I would say that my brother is my favorite person in the world and the best artist I know. The coolest thing about me is my brother (Laughs).