It has been two years since action thriller The Night Agent landed on Netflix, but Luciane Buchanan, one of its stars, still gets messages about it — ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous.
“I get a lot of funny ones or funny theories that are totally off the mark,” she says. “But I guess the craziest one I would say was a tweet from Stephen King. What's going on. What is this life?”
In his tweet, thriller writer King hailed Buchanan’s chemistry with co-star Gabriel Basso and called the show “farfetched, but ridiculously entertaining” — which might explain how it’s quietly become one of the biggest shows on Netflix, pulling in 62 million viewers for a total of 812 million hours since it first aired there in 2023.
For 31-year-old Buchanan, who plays one of the main characters, Rose, it’s been quite a journey. Born in Auckland, New Zealand, she grew up wanting to be an actor “from day dot.”
She went to acting school and booked small jobs with films that came to shoot in New Zealand. Then, during the Covid lockdown, just as she thought she might step away from acting for good, she won the part in The Night Agent with a self-tape.
She was cast as Rose, a tech entrepreneur who ends up going on the run with protagonist Peter Sutherland (Basso) after assassins come for her and her family. “I didn't think it would be a reality being from New Zealand: it felt like a farfetched dream,” Buchanan says.
These days, she’s based in New York, and in addition to filming The Night Agent, has a role in the upcoming Apple TV+ drama series Chief of War coming up, in which she stars as the queen consort of Hawaii, Kaʻahumanu, opposite Jason Momoa.
“It was the biggest shock of my life when I got the audition for Chief of War: oh my gosh, Apple is making a story about ancient Polynesia. It just was something that I didn't think would be in my lifetime,” says the actress who is of Polynesian heritage.
“What’s that show gonna do for the future of Polynesian film and television? I hope it's just the start.”
That said, she did have to run the gauntlet of auditions first. “Normally Polynesian woman, especially in ancient Polynesia, they had long frizzy hair and my manager was like ‘I think we need to buy a wig.’ For a chemistry read with Jason Momoa.”
Buchanan ended up buying a cheap wig. “It was not pinned or anything,” she laughs. “And at the end of the audition, they were like, ‘Are you wearing a wig by any chance? You look so different.’ I was like yes and the longer we talked the more my hairline was changing.”
Though she’s based in America, she’s keen to make work all over, including the UK. “I would love to explore the crime dramas over there. I don't want to just limit myself to one place.”
And as to what she looks for in a part? “In Chief of War I had to learn another language,” she says, “So, really it’s anything that challenges me in a really hard way.”
The Night Agent season two is streaming on Netflix from January 23
