In Netflix’s Wayward, Alyvia Alyn Lind delivers a raw and quietly electric performance as Leila, a teen navigating the horrors of a so-called therapeutic boarding school—one that’s more about control and compliance than actual healing. It’s a show that dives deep into the psychological toll of institutionalized and intergenerational trauma, and Lind’s portrayal stands out as both guarded and heartbreaking. But getting into Leila’s headspace wasn’t just a matter of reading lines.
“The preparation was a long journey,” Lind tells me. “I dove into the history of these corrupt correctional schools… survivor blogs, books, literally anything to try to get into the headspace of what a kid trapped in one of these places would feel like.”
That immersive research was only part of the equation. Showrunner and star Mae Martin’s personal connection to the story—Wayward is loosely based on a real-life friend’s experience—offered Alyvia and her co-star Sydney Topliffe (who plays Abbie) an intimate roadmap to their characters’ emotional core. A “crazy long” document detailing everything from early-2000s music to the heartbreak of losing a friend became a touchstone. “Just lots of conversations, lots of research,” she adds. “I love fixating on stuff.”
And that intensity paid off—especially in moments when Leila’s sarcasm drops and something more vulnerable breaks through.
“I think the most pivotal moment for Leila is in the hot seat room with Abbie,” Lind explains. “Everything changes in that moment, whether she wants it to or not.” But it was episode six, dealing with Abbie’s trauma and Leila’s own crisis of worth, that caught her by surprise while reading the script. “I was like, ‘What? Leila, no!’”
Still, behind all that darkness you’ll find a story about intense love between friends, and the devastating strength it takes to let someone go.
“There’s nobody that Leila loves more in the world than Abbie,” she says. “And now Evelyn’s saying, ‘You’re hurting her.’ That is the most terrifying thing of all.”
From frog emojis to donut metaphors and one haunting all-night shoot that left her emotionally wrecked long after the cameras stopped rolling, Alyvia dives deep in our conversation about the layered world of Wayward. Below, we bob and weave between the emotional and the absurd (her character’s donut would feature Cinnamon Toast Crunch and something special) in a Q&A that shows just how much she poured into Leila—and why she’s one of the most exciting young talents on screen right now.
MCKENZIE MORRELL: The show takes place in this disturbing world of therapeutic boarding schools. How did you emotionally prepare to play someone who’s not just trapped in it, but quietly plotting her escape with her best friend?
ALYVIA ALYN LIND: The preparation was a long journey. It was multiple weeks before we started filming. I dove into the history of these corrupt correctional schools and found literally anything I could find on it, you know, documentaries, survivor blogs, books, literally anything to try to get into the headspace of what a kid trapped in one of these places would feel like and what it would be like, along with talking to Mae, our wonderful showrunner and star, a lot. Many conversations about what it was like for them—the story is based on Mae’s best friend who got sent to one of these schools when they were teenagers and escaped. Lots of conversations with them about what that felt like and they wrote Sydney and I a wonderful document that was crazy long about their entire experience being a teen in the 2000s and what it was like when their friend got sent away, music recommendations, and basically everything to get us into Abbie and Leila’s heads, and that was so helpful as well. Just lots of conversations, lots of research. I love fixating on stuff.
MM: That must’ve been helpful to get into your character. In terms of Leila she does hide behind the sarcasm and she does want to be in control to an extent. What was the most surprising moment for you when you found her defense dropped at that moment?
AAL: I think that the most pivotal moment for Leila in the whole series is in the hot seat room with Abbie. I think that everything changes in that moment whether she wants it to or not. I think there’s a few different moments in the beginning of the series going through where it also kind of cracks away at this defense that she puts up and chips away at this wall she’s built so strong to let nobody get in and I think that those moments that were really important to me to show where they do get into her head and they do chip away at that wall. I think the most surprising thing while just reading the scripts was episode six as well with her backstory of her sister dying. Another huge moment for her because I think it explores why she feels so worthless and why she feels like she needs to stay here and why she feels that they can help her and obviously Evelyn’s manipulation. I think that she has such an insane arc over the season. There are so many of those moments where I was reading and I was like, “What? Leila, no!”
MM: Like what is going on? You wanted to shake her a little bit, right? Why are you making this choice?
AAL: Yes! Snap out of it!
MM: To lighten the conversation up for a second, what three emojis would you send to a friend to describe the show? Without any context, would you send these three emojis, and they would just have to figure out what it’s about.
AAL: Okay, frog emoji for sure. Oh my gosh, I don’t know. Frog emoji, runner emoji. And shocked emoji.
MM: Those are definitely three great ones.
AAL: Honorary mention: If there’s a door emoji, then that, also.
MM: That’ll be a bonus emoji. Leila and Abbie have this intensely loyal friendship. We see that from the beginning and throughout the series. How did you and Sydney build your dynamic off screen and did it ever surprise you how Leila’s love for Abbie pushed her deeper into this darkness?
AAL: First of all, Sydney and I connected immediately. We were such fast friends off screen and that’s why they made it so easy to be such great friends on screen. When we first met, we were sitting in a park, and we sat there for maybe four hours, and a man that was walking and doing loops around the park came up to us and was like, “I’ve been here for two hours, and every time I loop around, you guys are sitting in the same exact position, so locked into the conversation you’re having. You must be best friends.” And it was the first time we’d ever hung out. We were like, “Yeah, we are best friends!” And we almost started crying, and we decided that’s the perfect story to describe Sydney and I’s relationship. I think that my favorite part while watching the show was seeing the relationship deteriorate, and I’m really happy with how it ended up playing out on screen because I think that there’s nobody that Leila loves more in the world than Abbie to an extent of the fact that now Evelyn’s saying, “You’re hurting her.” And that is the most terrifying thing of all. When she’s pushing her away, I don’t even think that she’s pushing her away in a way that’s like, you’re hurting me, or you’re bringing me down. It’s more about, I’m bringing you down and that’s why you need to get out and I need to fix myself. Which is even more depressing and sad and, my gosh, I hate it. I have hope for them. I love them. I’m so protective over them. I really hope that one day they find each other again when they’re both in better headspaces.
MM: Hopefully, yeah. That’s the ultimate sacrifice of just being like, hey I love you enough to let you go because you need to flourish and I need to work on what’s going on inside me. It was amazing seeing that throughout the series. Now, the music was a big factor in the vibes of this series. The soundtrack definitely set the tone. If you were to make a mix CD to help express your current vibe or your current state of mind, what three songs would be on your playlist?
AAL: Okay, I love this question! I love music. Right now, oh my gosh. Three songs. Song of my summer and now song of my fall. One of my very good friends, Jack Gray, is an Australian music artist and he’s so incredible, and he just released a song called Dumb Sh*t and it’s so good and I just love it so much. That’s one of them. I love depressing indie music and I’m sorry about it but I just love it so much. Letter to an Old Poet by boygenius is depressing, and I love that song. And the third, let’s go with something more fun. Maybe a Leonard Cohen song, maybe like Chelsea Hotel. Honorary mention: Paper Bag by Fiona Apple is one of my favorite songs ever.
MM: Sometimes you just have to be in your feelings and listen to something depressing. Also, you star alongside some amazing actors and obviously Mae Martin. Their writing is very personal and Toni Collette’s Evelyn is deeply invasive. Did you ever push back during the creative process or argue for different emotional beats with either one or both of them, especially in scenes where Leila resists the pull of Evelyn. Did you ever not agree with the creative direction of something?
AAL: Oh, so interesting. There was one moment at the end of the series where in the last moment when Leila and Abbie say goodbye at the window, there was a moment where—I don’t remember who it was on set that suggested this. I don’t remember who it was. But somebody suggested it as a separate take to have a moment where Leila screams out the window at the cops and outs Abbie and Rory and tells them where they are and is like, “Hey, they’re over here!” and I immediately was like, that’s not right. Leila at this point, maybe she wants to better herself, but she would never out Abbie and Rory like that. They made it this far. She knows that they’re able to get out. She knows that she has to stay. I think that was the only moment. I don’t even think it was Mae that suggested that. But that was the only moment in the show because everything else was just written so well and Leila’s character was so well grounded in every single way and Mae’s writing is so incredible. Everything that was on the page was really who she was.
MM: I feel like if they went that direction, it would have been the ultimate betrayal between these two friends. Definitely glad you pushed back on that one. And now, was there a moment in filming where you felt emotionally shaken? Like, not just as your character but as yourself, whether it was with your storyline or some of the other storylines that were going on, like the realizations where you just like, oh my god, this is like some deep stuff.
AAL: Yeah. I think that it was in episode six—was obviously the most mentally challenging one to film. There was one moment where I’m—I’ve been acting since I was three. And so I’m generally pretty good at switching back and forth and not like, keeping myself in it at all and not feeling stuck in the emotion I’m in on screen. But there was one moment when we were filming episode six where it was the scene where Jess dies and we had to film that sequence in such a specific order because it’s going back and forth between me jumping in the pool and me not jumping in the pool. It was like, we can’t get our hair wet this time. It was an all night shoot. We shot from like, 6 p.m. to 8 a.m. or something. And the last thing of the night, because of the continuity of my hair and makeup and everything, was giving Jess CPR and screaming out, “Please save me, please save me!” It was 7 a.m., the sun was coming up, we had to get it, so we did a five minute take of me screaming as loud as I possibly could and crying my eyes out and pumping on poor Devin (Cecchetto)—the girl who plays my sister’s chest.
MM: Oh no.
AAL: And after that, they said cut, and we had to wrap immediately. It was like, “Okay, we wrapped! Everybody get out, get out!” I got in the van to go back to the base camp and I just sat there and I couldn’t stop crying for an hour after that. I couldn’t turn it off. That was probably my first time in my career that I felt that way, I can’t turn this off right now. It was too much.
MM: If your character could break the fourth wall for just ten seconds and say something to the viewers, what do you think she’d say?
AAL: Oh my gosh, these are such good questions. See, the thing is that what she would say at the beginning of the series is so different from what she would say at the end of the series. I’m going to go with at the beginning of the series because I think she’s funnier and more wise-ass. Maybe she would just literally look and she’d be like, “What are you doing? Why are you watching us?” Or she would just be talking to Mr. Turner and look at it and…just a simple eye roll. I feel like if she’s going to break the fourth wall at any moment in the season, it would be when she’s talking to Mr. Turner.
MM: I’m going to throw you my final question, which is my signature question. Are you ready for it?
AAL: Yes!
MM: If you were to construct a donut based on your character’s personality, what kind of donut would it be and what toppings would be on it?
AAL: For Leila, I think it would be a chocolate glazed donut with Cinnamon Toast Crunch sprinkled on top of it and bacon bits on top of it and chopped up edibles sprinkled on top of it. And then filled with a strawberry jam or something. I think the most important part would be the edibles chopped up and spread on top. Some sort of weed.
MM: Yes, I’ve gotten some really good answers over the years. So that one’s going to go on the Top 10 of all the donut combinations. I just want to thank you again for taking the time to chat with me. I hope to see you in many, many more things, and hopefully we’ll get an extension of the series at some point. That would be nice as well.
AAL: Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. This was such a fun interview.
MM: You’re welcome, Alyvia. It was so nice chatting with you and hopefully we get to talk soon!
WAYWARD is available for streaming on Netflix.
LEAVE A REPLY