How the Star of ‘Resident Evil: Requiem’ Fell in Love With Her Scaredy-Cat Hero

Angela Sant'Albano, who plays new 'Resident Evil' hero Grace Ashcroft, talks about playing to frights in Capcom's latest zombie horror. Resident Evil: Requiem, the latest entry in Capcom’s iconic zombie series, is out and already selling like hot cakes within the first week of its release. Based on temperature checks of fans sharing clips online, the game is a perfect mix of the series’ desperate, over-the-top action and viscerally unnerving horror. In short, it’s the best of both worlds. While series mainstay Leon Kennedy clears the room like John Wick, as the fabric of his shirt holds on for dear life to his muscles, the other half of Requiem‘s winning formula that fans are equally enamored with is its second playable character, Grace Ashcroft. In contrast to the series’ ensemble of competent action heroes, Grace is more like us common folk: a bumbling scaredy-cat born to whimsy and forced to lock in and face the horrors straight on. In a short period of time, players have already embraced Grace as one of their favorite characters in the series’ 30-year history. Key among their praise (naturally in the form of memes) is how her shaky grip on a gun twice her size, habit of tripping mid-sprint into well-lit rooms that were safe just moments before, perpetually perturbed facial expressions, and her remarkable voice acting crank up the game’s horror to 11, whether you’re playing in first or third person. Hell, it even scared the likes of Ice-T. If anything, her panic-driven playstyle perfectly complements Leon’s quippy, motorcycle-riding, super-kick-and-axe-swinging action-movie power fantasy, serving as a mirror of how players would actually look if they were dropped into the game. We spoke with Grace’s voice and motion-capture actor Angela Sant’Albano about how she brought Requiem‘s deeply relatable character to life. © Capcom While Sant’Albano has worked across film and TV, most recently on HBO’s Industry, Requiem marks her first foray into video games. What’s more, it sees her take center stage for the first time as the FBI agent in over her head. What’s spelled for the worst time in Grace’s life is actually a role Sant’Albano has been dying to play. “I’d always wanted to work in the horror space just because I thought it’s such a challenge for an actor, the stakes are always so incredibly high. When Resident Evil came my way—I’ve known it to have such a huge cultural impact—I couldn’t possibly turn it away,” Sant’Albano said. Grace may carry the lineage of Resident Evil Outbreak‘s Alyssa Ashcroft as her adoptive daughter, giving her a connection to the series’ newer canon that Resident Evil 7‘s Ethan Winters never had, but Sant’Albano saw that legacy less as a template and more as permission to break the mold. Instead of echoing the franchise’s long line of strong female characters, she relished the chance to build an entirely different kind of protagonist who was a great departure from past series heroines. “When I first got her bio, I thought, ‘You know what, she’s just an everyday civilian thrown into an incredibly terrifying situation.’ We all want to believe that we would be the hero who would stand up and fight, grab the gun, and shoot the villain, but the reality is that’s not real life. Sometimes, you would run and you would hide in a corner and scream, and then you would have moments of great courage,” Sant’Albano said. “She’s a very accurate portrayal of real human moments of extreme courage and moments of cowardice.” While filming as Grace’s motion capture for the better part of a year and a half, Sant’Albano says her character starts out as a very introverted woman who’s uneasy around people. But her unwitting hero’s journey forces her to face her past trauma as she grows more into herself. “Without giving too much away, she ends up caring for people in a very deeply human way,” she said. “I think she’s very resilient, and I think her vulnerability makes her victories a lot more meaningful because she’s not always just ready to fight. When she does have a moment of courage, it makes the payoff greater.” © Capcom Although Grace served as Sant’Albano’s first-ever video game role, she is no stranger to the hobby. Almost true to form with her character, the variety of games she grew up playing is a far cry from the frights Resident Evil is wont to dish out. Instead of dealing with Lickers, punching giant boulders, and running from Mr. X, she was obsessed with her Nintendo, playing games like Super Mario Bros. and forgotten gems like Nintendogs. However, after landing the role as Grace, Sant’Albano upped her game by dipping into titles like Indiana Jones and Skyrim. But to prepare for Requiem, Sant’Albano specifically dove into playing Resident Evil 4 and Resident Evil 7—honestly, two of the best games she could&