By Breanna Milton

On the north-west corner of Spain, the coast stretches for hundreds of kilometres. Mountainous cliffs tower overhead, covered with forested rolling hills. Cathedrals touch the sky and greenish blue water envelops its edges. In this quiet beach community with Celtic roots, rain is a frequent visitor. It’s the “Scotland of Spain,” as Paloma Stewart, a former Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) student, calls it.

Having traded a life in Spain for Toronto, to pursue acting, Stewart’s career led her back—ironically close to her hometown—to film a TV show in Galicia, Spain.

She’d just left her second year of TMU’s performance acting program to film the TV show, Marusia. Vientos de honor. The story follows three female students who enter the Naval Military School of Marin, while a student’s death the year prior is under investigation.

Born and raised in northern Spain, Stewart moved to Canada in Grade 11. She carries an energy like rays of sunshine peeking through the cloudy skies here in Toronto. Her excitement about acting is palpable through the laptop screen where she shared her story.

Back in Spain, her parents owned a theatre company where they taught kids English through acting. Growing up around theatre and attending her parents classes, acting became second nature for her. Stewart had always been surrounded by creativity and so her longing to perform grew.

“I think it’s something that has always been a part of me, so I don’t really know what my life would look like if my parents hadn’t been actors,” she said.

She got her first agent at the age of eight. “I didn’t book any roles. It was just for fun,” she said. It wasn’t until she was 12 years old that she started taking it seriously.

There were no arts programs in her home town in Spain, so they moved to Toronto, where her dad’s family lives, so she could study acting.

Door after door closed, causing her to believe that there was something about her that was wrong. Whether she didn’t have the right look or she didn’t have a strong enough accent, it became difficult to stay confident.

“You’re fighting the whole time and everybody’s telling you that you’re worth nothing, that you don’t fit for the role. You’re just not quite there yet,” said Stewart.

But her passion drove her to keep chasing an acting career.

While at TMU, Stewart had agents both in Spain and in Toronto. She was also working five jobs, attending auditions and keeping up with school.

Yet, she felt stuck in Toronto. As a child, she performed in recitals and a few short films, but the opportunities just weren’t lining up.

It wasn’t until last winter, when she was in Spain for the Christmas break, that she got a call from a casting director, who had seen so many of her tapes over the years and remembered her. The casting director asked Stewart to send a self-tape, and soon after, she was flown to Madrid for an audition.

On Christmas Eve, the call for Marusia. Vientos de honor came in. “The timing was perfect,” she said.

Not only could Stewart fill a role in Spain as a young woman who never looked or sounded Spanish enough, but her tireless efforts paid off. “Every actor talks about this, it’s really hard to keep going and stay consistent in the industry because part of your job is auditioning all the time and you never get paid for it,” said Stewart.

But she added, “If you’re very passionate about something, it doesn’t really matter how many times you get slapped in the face. You just want to keep chasing it.”

Like many new professionals, Stewart experienced bouts of imposter syndrome. As a new actor on set, sometimes she wondered whether she was good enough or if she belonged. “Being a young woman in a career where your looks and the way you perform are what makes you money, it’s a lot of pressure,” she said.

But as she kept filming, her confidence and comfort in this new world grew stronger.

“Being on set was really beautiful because it made me discover a lot of parts of myself,” said Stewart. For her role, she had to do navy training. “It was a whole experience…I really had to go to the gym, gain some strength and muscle,” she said.

Her character, Carmela Baltar Gil, is a perfectionist, sometimes to her own disadvantage, reminding Stewart of the younger version of herself. “That’s something that I really relate to, especially when I was living in Canada. You just kind of want to do everything and work all the time.”

For now, Stewart’s focus will be filming in Spain and maybe even filming internationally in the future. If Marusia. Vientos de honor is the only thing Stewart does as an actor, she’s content with that. She can revel in the accomplishment her childhood self dreamt of.

She said it’s a comfort to have these challenging four years in Canada wrapped with something beautiful. She’s finally found the home she was searching for in Spain.