Sofia Pernas is opening up about her love story. ET’s Nischelle Turner spoke to the actress about her first impression of her now-husband, Justin Hartleyand how they turned their friendship into romance.
“My first and only impression was, God, that guy comes in and leaves as soon as the bell rings,” Pernas told ET of Hartley, who she met on the set of The Young and the Restless. “…Sometimes he would do up to 65 pages a day. He was just tearing out pieces, throwing them in the trash, as soon as he finished the scene. It was almost like soda fumes and then he would be gone. It was incredible.
At the time, Hartley was married to Chrishell Stauseso it was just a friendship between These are U.S star and actress. Hartley and Stause I gave up in 2019, however, a time when Pernas “was going through a very strong dry period”.
Pernas eventually decided to “start putting out feelers” for a possible love match, and one blossomed when she messaged Hartley in early 2020.
“I remember I texted him ‘happy new decade’ in January,” she said. “That’s it.”
For a while, the pair acted as “pen pals,” Pernas said, but when the COVID-19 pandemic began in March 2020, everything changed.
“We took a dip in the quarantine pool. I kind of never left him and we got married a year later,” she said.
Although Pernas noted that it’s “really cliché when you’re in a relationship to say that that person is obligated to be your best friend,” she insisted that Hartley “really is” that for her.
“It’s very rare when you seem to be on the same page with everything,” she said. “Of course there are growing pains in certain things, but when you know, you know. When you have the right person as a partner, you just go through the growing pains.”
“It felt so wrong because so many people were having a hard time during COVID and I was having the time of my life, just falling in love,” Pernas added. “… For us, it was working and working and working. (It was) so simple and easy that it was just a no-brainer.”
Now the couple is back to sharing the screen on Hartley’s show Tracker. Pernas said working alongside her husband again “was fun,” before describing the character she plays on the CBS series.
“She also seeks rewards. It’s one of those things where they do the same job, but they just have a different set of tricks,” she joked. “He does a very specific thing. She does a very specific thing. They used to work together back then.”
“I was kind of doing a job that I didn’t really like when I met him and I found out what he was doing and I kind of got caught up in that world. And then I, of course, got annoyed and I’m like, ‘I can do this too,’” Pernas added. “I kind of go off on my own, so to speak, and there was a big obstacle in their past when I did that.”
During their time working together, Pernas revealed that she and Hartley were able to spice up the script a bit.
“It wasn’t really planned for us to kiss,” she said. “We played around with a few moments where I felt like it was like, do they kiss in this moment? Just because there’s so much history, and there was so much tension, and there was a certain life-threatening event that happened a little bit before, so it’s all this pent-up pressure.”
As for whether she will return to the show, Pernas said her appearance “opened the door a little bit” for a possible continuation of her storyline.
“I love her. She’s such a cool character. She’s trying to hide a lot because obviously she’s very vulnerable,” she said of her character. “I think that’s so cool, seeing them both play. He’s obviously so self-assured and commanding and powerful when he walks into a room, but I think because of their history and everything that’s coming up, it’s nice to see that peep hole in vulnerability.”
Episode of Legs Tracker will air March 24 on CBS.
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