Montreal's Evelyne Brochu becomes a spy in X-Company

Evelyne Brochu, a Montreal actor with several lead roles in feature films, is taking on her second role in an English-Canadian television series.

The boys and I knew we had something important in [our] hands, but you never know till you see it, Brochu says of the new CBC Television series X-Company, premiering Feb. 18.

The boys she's referring to are Jack Laskey (Hatfields & McCoys), Warren Brown (Luther), Dustin Milligan (90210), Connor Price (Being Human), and Hugh Dillon (Flashpoint).

X-Company is based on a real spy training camp situated on a farm near Whitby, Ont.during the Second World War.

Brochu is the only woman in the team of five people plucked from their regular lives for spy training, before being sent on missions behind enemy lines in German-occupied France.

There are a lot of fun facts about the camp, including that Ian Fleming who wrote the James Bond books trained there," she says.

A lot of his cool James Bond inspirations came from that camp.

Brochus character, Aurora, is a French-Canadian/Jewish-German undercover specialist.

Brochu calls her a curious, bold, opinionated woman who worked as a journalist in Paris before the war.

The cool thing about Aurora is that she gets to become a lot of different people," she says.

"In episode three, shes in a brothel. As a woman in a war, people can be less suspicious of you so you can get very close to the enemy. Its dangerous and exciting.

Brochu feels strongly about playing a strong female character in a television series.

It needs to not be a trend and become a thing," she says.

"Women cant only be the person only there to french kiss the hero after hes won the game or won the war. Women are half of humanity. Theyre part of history. Theyre part of intimate stories and part of greater stories.

Listen to Evelyne Brochu talk about X-Company, her role in Orphan Black, her lead role in a new feature film, Les loups by Sophie Deraspe and and how she feels art is an exercise in empathy with host Jeanette Kelly on Cinq six, Saturday, Feb. 14 at 5 p.m. ET.

Les loups opens the Rendez-vous du cinma qubcois Feb. 19.

Cinq a Six1:53Montreal actor Evelyne Brochu on lead role in X-Company for CBC TV

Evelyne Brochu tells Jeanette Kelly she thinks strong women characters like the role she plays in X-Company, the new CBC Television spy drama are long overdue.