SPOILER ALERT: The following contains spoilers for Paradise Season 2, Episode 3.

Enuka Okuma is a fan-favorite on television’s best show. In the Hulu drama Paradise, she portrays Dr. Teri Rogers-Collins, the missing wife of series hero Xavier Collins. Season 2 reveals how Xavier and Teri first met, but thanks to great writing and a fantastic performance by Enuka, the audience has fallen in love with Teri too.

“They talk about Teri so much in Season 1 that you feel her presence even though she’s not there,” Enuka told the MOTIVATE with Brittany Frederick podcast. “It was only watching the series that I realized just how important the character is. Season 2 is a whole other ball game, and there’s not too much I can say, but it was just really cool to learn more about Teri throughout the season.”

What’s critically important is that Teri is fully developed as her own person, not simply Xavier’s wife and the mother of his two children. In Paradise Season 2, Episode 3, “Another Day in Paradise,” viewers learn more about what Teri has accomplished and what her goals are. She’s studying for a doctorate (which fans know she’ll complete) and has an impressive career plan. Plus, she’s absolutely unafraid of speaking her mind; her first interaction with her future husband is throwing Jell-O at him.

“Great attitude, right out of the gate,” Enuka laughed. “This is a feisty one, and I think they kept it up. When we see the meet cute story of Teri and Xavier, it’s neat to see all the little characteristics of her personality that were already there, in who she was and how she was fully formed. It solidifies the type of person that she is, and it carries throughout.”

But it’s not just the Paradise writers who deserve credit for making Teri such an interesting character. Enuka playing Teri is a huge reason why the character is so successful. She brings that feistiness to her, while also imbuing her with grace and charm. Viewers have responded to Teri feeling like someone they can not only care about, but actively root for. And she’s just one of the memorable characters whom Enuka has been playing recently.

Audiences also saw her as a surrogate mother in Season 1 of the Emmy Award-winning medical drama The Pitt, and as a doctor whom Ron tried to flirt with in the comedy St. Denis Medical. What’s more challenging for Enuka to portray: intense and layered drama like Paradise and The Pitt, or the comic timing and chemistry seen in St. Denis Medical?

“Whether it is comedy or drama, it’s all about keeping it real,” she reflected. “To keep it real is challenging for different reasons in both genres. The tendency is to not go too big in a comedy; the tendency is to not go too big in something that is high-stakes and full of drama. That’s always hard, too. it’s just always about finding that real, honest place. Actors, we’re notoriously hard on ourselves for not being able to find that place, but you anchor yourself with with colleagues that are that are going through the same thing, and you keep an eye on each other.”

Watch the full MOTIVATE with Brittany Frederick episode with Enuka Okuma below to hear more about working with her Paradise co-star Sterling K. Brown, what it was like pretending to give birth on The Pitt, and what she’s inspired by now.

Paradise streams Mondays on Hulu. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Hulu.

Article content is (c)2020-2026 Brittany Frederick and may not be excerpted or reproduced without express written permission by the author. Follow me on Twitter at @BFTVTwtr and on Instagram at @BFTVGram. For story pitches, contact me at tvbrittanyf@yahoo.com.