Leighton Meester Says Playing a Mom in 'The Weekend Away' Is 'Exactly Me' in Real Life

Leighton Meester is getting real about the realities of motherhood.

Opening up about her role as Beth, a new mom who takes a vacation, in Netflix's thriller The Weekend Away, Meester, 35, told Cosmopolitan UK that she instantly connected with her character.

"When I got the script and the breakdown, originally it was like 'a 35-year-old with a 10-month-old.' That is exactly me," the Gossip Girl alum said in the video interview, which was released Thursday. "I really was excited about playing a new mother who's having a weekend away for the first time — which is both the most exciting prospect and the most terrifying when you have a new baby, especially for the first time. "

Meester continued, "[The Weekend Away is] definitely centered around her journey to motherhood and how that is coloring her experiencing and how she's seeing the world now. I thought that was really something I could really dig into and enjoy."

Meester and husband Adam Brody, 42, share 6-year-old daughter Arlo Day and a son, whom they welcomed in 2020. The pair has not revealed his name.

The actress added that "the element of being away from your child," like Beth is in the film, "is very different than when you're with your child."

"There's a need, at least for me, when anything happens — if your kid gets hurt or something happens — that that's the number one concern. And you have to be the grown-up — which it's really hard to be, even when you are the grown-up — and set the tone and be calm and comforting and freak out later."

"But she's not with her kid," Meester said of her character, Beth. "That would drive me mad. I would be devastated to be in a situation like that and be thousands of miles away from my kid."

In October 2020, Brody opened up to PEOPLE about being a father, shortly after the arrival of his and Meester's second child together.

"It's been pretty magical," Brody said at the time. "It's such a crazy time for everyone and we're so, so, so fortunate that we have some of the security we do and have the flexibility with our jobs we do. We talk about it all the time and we're just ridiculously fortunate and lucky."

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Joking that the couple opted to call their son "Joe Biden until after the election," Brody added, "To be more or less quarantined during [this] time — the last trimester of pregnancy and the fourth trimester, if you will — has its benefits," he said of their time together during the coronavirus pandemic. "You've gotten to be in a cocoon. The world outside is scary for the moment and also thrilling and hopeful."

"For us, luckily in this time in our lives, this moment in our lives, this family growing by one has definitely had its magical moments and it's had its benefits, for sure," Brody said.