Cassie Steele is known for playing Manny Santos on the Canadian drama, Degrassi. In the eight years Degrassi has been around, Cassie’s character has transformed from a nice, lovable girl to a smart and independent woman who has made good and bad decisions. Cassie also has an album out and a new one on the way. Blogcritics had a chance to chat with her to find out about her new album, what it was like on the Degrassi set, and living in L.A.

She said that the audition process is “...blurry. It’s been eight years now. I had just come from a track meet. I just went for three auditions and at first I auditioned for Liberty. And then I got the role of Manny.”

Sarah Barrable-Tishauer, who plays Liberty, actually originally auditioned for Manny. Blogcritics interviewed her two years ago. She told us, “I think it would be interesting to see if we actually had gotten the other role we auditioned for. I played Manny and Cassie played Liberty. I think it would have been interesting to see what would have happened there.”

But Cassie wouldn’t want to switch parts; she’d stick with Manny. Asked why, she replied, “The thing is the characters all kind of turn into us in the end. When you’re in a TV show for a year, your character is bound to be like you. You can’t really hide who you are, right? I think Manny — I don’t know — she’s my favorite character.”

When asked what viewers should expect from Manny this season, she responded, “She’s really hot. She’s in university, growing up. Everybody knows Manny. She’s always into trying new things.”

When I asked for spoilers, all she could tell me was, “I really like yoga.” I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Cassie is also very clumsy, it appears. The other day on set, Cassie told me, “I fell down some stairs. Like a flight of stairs. It was scary. There are a lot of embarrassing things that happen on set. I’m like accident prone. I get cuts and bruises. I run into walls. Some of the sets move and I forget. I will lean on a wall and the wall would fall down.”

Her favorite episode to film was “U Got the Look” way back in season three. This is the episode where Manny gets into loving cutesy little things like stuffed animals and starts dressing a little more risqué. The infamous blue thong appears in that episode. It’s her favorite, because “that’s when Manny starts to change.”