Lorraine Toussaint is revealing what it’s like to work alongside Queen Latifah.
Toussaint dished on some behind-the-scenes moments on the set of The Equalizer during an interview with PEOPLE at the NAACP Image Awards Creative Honors on Friday, Feb. 21. When asked if 54-year-old Latifah, who both acts in and executive produces the CBS series, ever bursts out into raps, Toussaint says: “She does!”
“In fact, she does. It’s the first set I’ve been on where, between takes, she will come and she will show up with a boom box and start to — I’m for real — she will blast tunes,” the actress, 64, continues. “Just whatever she’s in the mood for, whatever she’s rocking that day.”
“There’s definitely music behind the scenes on our set because of Queen,” Toussaint laughs.
The Equalizer premiered in 2021 and stars Latifah as Robin McCall, Liza Lapira as Melody, Laya DeLeon Hayes as Delilah and Toussaint as Viola Marsette. Thinking back on the past few years, Toussaint says she has built a “family” among the cast.
“This is season 5 of The Equalizer, we really are a family,” she gushes. “As close as we seem to be on the screen, we really are that close.”
“I love me some Queen and Baby Laya!” she adds. “It’s really a good family, and we’re solid.”
Hayes has echoed that sentiment in the past, telling PEOPLE in October 2021 that both Latifah and Toussaint — who play her mom and aunt on the show — offered her “some wonderful advice” when they first started.
“I’ll tell you one thing, while we were filming season two, one piece of advice they gave me was not to eat the food while doing a scene with food,” Hayes recalled. “And I was like, ‘All right, I’m not going to do that again.’”
“When you do a bunch of takes and you’re eating food in a scene, you’re going to have to get it from all different angles,” she went on to explain. “So you’re going to be eating, like, the same piece of food, and it has to be the exact same one at the exact same time for the next three hours.”
She also credited Latifah for taking her under her wing during the first couple of seasons.
“She really is the coolest,” Hayes said. “It was immediate in season one. It was really easy when we were about to shoot the pilot, you know, I think from day one. She’s really wanted to make it a collaborative effort for Robyn and Delilah and take a lot of my own experiences with me and my mom and add them into the scenery, so they can become Robyn and Delilah’s thing as well.”
“I think it’s been wonderful to be able to actually bond and really get to know one another this season,” she continued. “That’s just because we can safely do that.”
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The Equalizer airs Sundays at 9 p.m. ET on CBS.
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