ROOKIE BLUE: Enuka Okuma discusses new episode

I recently got to chat with Enuka Okuma who currently plays Traci Nash on ABC’s summer cop drama Rookie Blue. The next new episode, titled Girls Night Out, airs Thursday and focuses on Traci’s first day of detective rotation.

NGTV: I hear you guys got picked up for a fourth season this morning?
Enuka: Yes we did.

NGTV: Congratulations
Enuka: Thanks, there is lots of celebrating going on.

NGTV: I’m glad. So Girls Night Out?
Enuka: Yes, this is a good one. It’s a good one. It’s Traci’s first day as a detective.

NGTV: So you are like a rookie all over again?
Enuka: That’s exactly right, Leah. I am a rookie all over again. It’s…it’s screwing up and being very very scared and and, you know, all of those things that come with first day jitters, all over again.

NGTV: Does this make Jerry (her love interest on the show) your new training officer?
Enuka: Umm [laughs] it does actually and it makes it very very difficult at work. You work with your boyfriend as well as um your…your boss. Now Traci’s going to get a bit of a taste of what Andi was going through.

NGTV: I was going to mention that was what the whole first episode was about, that is what got Andi in trouble, you know?
Enuka: Yeah, yeah the girls commiserate for sure. [laughs]

NGTV: You play such a strong female character, you are a single parent with a very dangerous job. Is getting out of the line of fire, so to say, part of the motivation for your character becoming a detective?
Enuka: You know, she has always been ambitious and they they have been setting it up pretty much from the beginning that Traci would be going in this direction, I didn’t think it would happen as quickly as it did, but it’s exciting to get to do this, that I’d be um a detective. But uh, but yeah, she has always had that path and never lets anything stop her. So I don’t know if it was to get out of the line of fire, but more if Traci wants to do something nothing is going to stop her.

NGTV: How long does your detective rotation last? Are we going to go a few more episodes or the rest of the season?
Enuka: Well she’s she’s a detective in training now. I mean in our, in our photograph I was the only one not in uniform. I’m not sure what is going to happen next year with the character but this is where she is happy and flourishing.

Enuka is a talented actress as well as a writer and director, having a short film debut a few years back at a number of film festivals. When I asked her about the possibility of directing an upcoming Rookie Blue episode she says she never says never.

Check out Enuka in this clip from tonight’s episode:

Rookie Blue airs Thursday 10/9c on ABC.