"So when my dad tells stories of being talked down to," Lozano continues, "the assumptions that come with that are almost humorous, because my dad is the furthest thing from a janitor who lives in the basement, to put it frankly. When he said that, I thought: That’s interesting that that’s how much of the media is portraying Hispanics. I just think we can expand even more our depiction of who we are." Lozano’s dad, Eduardo, is an architect; Mom Elizabeth, a Spanish teacher; and Lozano’s two older sisters, Julieta (a district attorney) and Paula (a pediatrician), complete the accomplished family. "It’s like these are my favorite people and there are people who bring out the worst in me," she says, laughing. "I have so much to thank my parents for, in terms of how they brought us up. They always were very encouraging to us—stressed education. My dad was pretty strict with us, which at the time seemed harsh, but now, in retrospect, I’m glad that he was able to give us the structure."

Lozano, who is in her late 20s, says she now realizes that the fact that her parents are first-generation Latin-American (they emigrated from Argentina as a young married couple) has a lot to do with who she is. "I didn’t realize that growing up. It was when I got to New York that I was like: Wow! I’m Hispanic. Because growing up, I just felt different. We’re weird. Because there was really no one else to whom I could say, ‘She has the same thing that I have, that no one else has, like having dinner at 9 p.m., when everyone else has dinner at 7. My family ate later than everyone in the neighborhood."

Lozano was born in Princeton, N.J., and grew up in Newton Center, Mass. Although she lived in New York for more than six years, "I do feel very connected to New England. My idea of a beautiful place is Maine, where I used to summer, and rocky shores and pine trees. To me, New England will always be the most beautiful place in the world because it’s where I grew up. Even though my parents are Argentine, so much of me culturally is what New England is." She adds. "I feel that I’m an interesting mixture in that way…that I’m very much of this country in some ways, and in other ways, a reflection of my parents’ values and morals and their culture, which was very different. Where my parents came from it was warm at Christmas. It never got cold. My parents were horrified at how cold it got here," she recalls, "and to me, that’s just the way it is."

The actress describes Newton Center as an "intellectual, mostly white suburb. The school systems were excellent, which is why my parents moved there." Her mother teaches at Boston University, but when the time came for each daughter to consider higher education, the Lozanos never encouraged them to go to BU, where tuition is free for employees’ children. "They said the opposite. My mother didn’t want us to go to BU just because it was free. She said, ‘I want you to go where you want to go,’ and quite frankly, she thought we could get into better schools. They always pushed us really hard in academics, because they thought that was going to be our ticket for getting a good job we loved."

And, as mom predicted, Lozano’s college choices were prestigious indeed—she spent four years in the Ivy League. After spending a year and a half at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., Lozano transferred to Brown University in Providence, R.I. Lozano admits that she was overwhelmed by the Cornell campus. "Ithaca is awesome, in the true meaning the word…the geography, the gorgeous, tall buildings," she says. "I got such a sense of space in Ithaca, which was actually part of the reason I transferred. Providence has some cobblestones streets and the buildings are shorter. Cornell has a beautiful campus, but it was just so easy to get lost there."

Lozano found her way at Brown, where she majored in literature and was very active with theater. "I knew I wanted to be an actor, but I figured I’d be doing acting the rest of my life," she reasons. "So why not read some books and have something to bring to it? It was courses like that, literature courses, that I feel like that’s why I went to college. And I always did plays and I always did theater, but I didn’t want to be sitting in a lighting class when I could be reading James Joyce."

Reading the classes for pleasure was one thing, but studying for exams often fell by the wayside as Lozano "did plays all the time. I was on the theater board, and there was a regional theater in Providence caller the Trinity Rep," she explains. "They offered Brown students a chance to audition for the plays that the grad students were producing and directing. So that was great." Lozano remained in Providence the summer between her junior and senior years, sharing an attic room in a Victorian house with a girlfriend. "It was a great summer. I had a couple of little jobs. The reason the summer was so good was because I was doing so many things I enjoyed and not taking them too seriously," she say in retrospect.

Lozano laughs about it now, but the only audition she boomed at during that summer hiatus was a waitress—a real waitress. "Providence has many great restaurants and there was one called Alfredo’s, an Italian restaurants. I’d never waited tables before. I walked in thinking they would just say, ‘Fill out your name and come on in and wait tables,’ and they ended up giving me an exam. And on the test I had to define such things as béarnaise sauce, what was in béarnaise sauce. I had no idea; I had never tasted béarnaise. Another part of the exam was to write your description of the best meal, describe all the ingredients in it, what would go first, what would go second, what wine would go with what course. Then we to review three out of five cookbooks. I was just sweating, and so I ran out the side door. I fled. I was totally humbled."

Lozano had better luck—she believes—when, right out of Brown, she auditioned for the graduate division of New York University’s acting program and wasn’t accepted. "It’s such a God-send that I didn’t get into it when I wanted to because the two years I spent in the city acting were so important to me, in terms of growing up as a person, learning how to pay rent in the city, really taking some time to live as a person of the world. And I think I would have been pretty distracted in grad school if I had to worry about living in New York for the first time." (She performed with the Spanish Repertory Theater and did regional work outside of New York before she was later accepted at NYU)

"It was a time that paved a road for me, but it was also quite a shock coming to the city after living in Providence, coming from a family that was protective," she adds. "It was exciting and fun, but it was also hard." As she prepares to enter her second year on OLTL, Lozano is thinking about expanding her repertoire by getting back onstage. Yes, she’s having a blast playing Todd’s wife-for-hire) and actually has fallen in love with the louse), but "I miss rehearsals, I miss the chance to really get to work with the same material over an extended amount of time, which is something that theater affords you. I just signed up for a class, and at least that’ll give me a weekly time to go and slow a little bit. Maybe rehearse the same scene over three weeks, instead of a day." Otherwise, Lozano spends her free time with her boyfriend, actor Christopher Welch. "It was definite like at first sight," Lozano says with a laugh, explaining that the couple met doing Hamlet for a Colorado Shakespeare festival (he was the lead to her Ophelia).

"It’s funny—both of my sisters are also with people of the same profession. My sister’s married to a doctor, and my other sister [is engaged] to a lawyer. And I’m finding that it’s very satisfying to be with someone who can really understand what you’re talking about in terms of opening night, reviews, acting itself. I want him to do the best work he can as a actor, and he wants the same for me." Talking about her significant other and her sisters brings a smile to Lozano’s impossibly beautiful—even without makeup—face. "My family… I was just thinking about them as I walked down here," she says, referring to the restaurant where we are having our conversation. "I was thinking about my sisters—telling my sisters a joke, and seeing them laugh, and I realized that when my family and I are happy and having a good time, it is the best thing in the world. Like any family."