Why Piper Perabo Was Drawn to Playing the Villain — and Where Her ‘Butterfly’ Character Could Be Headed After That Finale

[This story contains spoilers from the season one finale of Butterfly.]

Prime Video’s new K-drama spy series Butterfly isn’t Piper Perabo’s first rodeo in the world of espionage. And even though she doesn’t actually throw a punch in the six-episode action-filled series that was filmed throughout the cities and countryside of South Korea, Perabo is quick to share that she’s not afraid to mix it up with fists, feet or whatever it takes to eliminate a threat.

Playing the main villain who causes the mayhem in the Daniel Dae Kim-starring series suits the actor just fine for now — in hopes that a season two could see her character, Juno, really letting hand-to-hand combat and bullets fly following that cliffhanger season one finale.

Juno will likely have to get more physical if season two is a go, as viewers saw in the finale that she’s now on the run, via a private plane, to escape just as her protégé and top killer, Rebecca (Reina Hardesty), entered the restroom of a small diner with the second wife of her father, David Jung (Kim). Rebecca is the daughter of David’s first wife, and she’s the child he abandoned about nine years earlier after Juno tried to kill him for wanting to leave the agency they created together called Caddis. 

When Rebecca and his wife, Eunju (Kim Tae-hee), take too long to return from the restroom, David gets suspicious and entered the bathroom to find his wife bleeding from a neck wound, and his daughter nowhere to be found. Could Juno be behind this treachery, as payback for David destroying her spy corporation and for changing his oldest daughter into a killer?

“I like being the bad guy,” she says. “I don’t get to portray villains a lot.”

The Hollywood Reporter recently caught up with Perabo in Montreal at a film premiere, and she was chomping at the bits to discuss the rigors of being a ruthless villain and loving mother in Butterfly‘s cutthroat world of espionage, the beauty of filming in South Korea and why her Hollywood characters are never timid about throwing hands, if necessary.

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You have done straight drama and comedy, but your forte lately has been action!

I’m drawn to all the genres. I don’t really read graphic novels, and I haven’t done anything that has that kind of source material before. Also, Daniel Dae Kim is an old friend of mine. We did an action movie together like 20 years ago, and stayed friends ever since. I was really interested in working in Korea. That brought a new twist to the source material, and obviously Dan, being Korean American, has such authentic insight into that place. I knew it would be fun to see that country with a friend who knows so much about it.

That was your first time in Korea?

Yes. When he called me and was like, “You want to spend six months in Korea?” I was like, “Actually, yeah! Am I going to be stuck in Seoul all of that time?” And he said no. We ended up filming in 20 different cities all over Korea. It was so cool to see a country that way. Our crew was Korean, and most of the actors in the show are Korean. It was a really amazing experience.

Getting into the series, what was Juno’s motivation? Is she the ultimate narcissist or just a cold-blooded killer who loves money and who is power hungry?

When it comes to business, Juno has decided she’s going to work for the highest bidder. That’s where she and David really parted ways. He wanted to make sure he was doing good in the world, and Juno decided that if you’ve got the money, you can hire her. On a deeper level, what I like about the story is that it’s one about a family of divorce. Juno got the kids. When David comes back, he’s not okay with that arrangement, and the kids are stuck in the middle. I like the action and I love the spy genre, but when I realized it’s a family drama right under the surface, that really appealed to me.

I want to ask you a similar question that I asked Daniel in a recent conversation: Does Juno love Rebecca, or does she love her assassinating skills?

I think it’s complicated. I think Juno really loves Rebecca, but also… like when I was in high school and you’re playing a sport and there are parents on the sidelines, those parents that scream from the sidelines who are too invested in the outcome of the game? That puts so much pressure on the kid. And that’s how I think about Juno. She’s one of those parents who walks onto the high school field and is screaming at the ref. And you’re like, “Hey, hey, it’s a kid.”  But Juno takes it to the global level.

Well, it seemed quite clear that she loves her son, Oliver (Louis Landau). But as her business and life starts to unravel, and she thinks Oliver has betrayed her, do you believe she ever gave serious thought about killing her only biological child?

The problem with Oliver is that it’s another kind of family problem, like those parents who think one kid is great at sports and the other sucks. (Laughs.) It’s so hard to be that kid, and I feel like Oliver lives in that space. Juno sees a lot of herself in Oliver, and she wants to believe that he can rise to her level, but so far he hasn’t shown her that and it’s tense.

Were you angling for more action in this series, or did you want to take a break and let the other stunt women handle this one?

I said to Ken Woodruff and Steph Cha, the writers, “You know, if Juno has to mix it up in season two, I’m into it!” I remember calling Daniel one night after he was filming a fight scene all night. He was like, “I’m not as young as I used to be (laughs).” I know that it’s hard, but I’ve always been interested in action sequences and that kind of fight choreography is interesting to me.

As I was thinking about asking you that question, the thought came across my mind, “Isn’t Piper the same woman who got into a physical and bloody brawl with Beth Dutton?” [In the fifth season of Yellowstone, Perabo played John Dutton’s activist love interest, Summer, who was under house arrest at the family ranch. Beth wasn’t having any of it, which culminated in a violent altercation between the two ladies on the front lawn.]

(Laughs.) Exactly! I can fight! I may not win, but I’ll get in there!

I have to ask about the finale. Where do you think Juno went when you got on the private jet, and do you think she had anything to do with David’s second wife, Eunju (Kim Tae-hee), having her throat cut in the bathroom of the small diner? Of course, we don’t know if Eunju died.

I personally hope she didn’t die, because Kim Tae-hee’s playing such a good actor. But Juno had a plane waiting, her right-hand man is still with her, and Juno had access to a lot of funds. In this world, money and a plane can get you pretty safe. But I don’t know. I was thinking about cracking that last scene. And when I think about where we would go from there, I don’t know what the writers want, but I feel that is how she could get out of Seoul. When you have a U.S. Senator on your trail [Senator Dawson played by Charles Parnell], there are limited places you can hide. But she has a lot of funds. 

Were you into Korean movies and Korean television shows before signing onto Butterfly?

Korean movies and Korean directors, for sure. When I got to Korea, I realized it’s even bigger than K-drama. In Korea they call it the K-Wave. There is a massive cultural output that is happening in Korea. In the entertainment system, we are aware that K-filmmaking is so prevalent in our business. But when you get there, you realize, “Oh my gosh, there’s so much coming!” There’s a renaissance happening in Korean culture right now.

What’s next for you, while hoping there’s a season two of Butterfly? And if there is one, how do you think Juno will evolve, if at all?

Well, I like being the bad guy. I don’t get to portray villains a lot. I kind of like how messed up she is. I like filming in Korea so much, and I like that it is a uniquely Asian/American story. And because Juno has to escape, I’m curious about where she would go. There are so many incredible cities in Southeast Asia. But I would love to stay in that part of the world, because I think it is beautiful and interesting, and it could add a lot to the show.

I had a film at Cannes this year called Peak Everything. It’s a Montreal indie film. We just found out that we are going to be the closing night film at TIFF. It’s very different than Butterfly, and it is fun to go back and forth between them.

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Butterfly is now streaming on Prime Video.