Sanaa Lathan Calls ‘Best Man’ Cast ‘Family’ in Exclusive Interview

Sanaa Lathan tends to bond deeply with her costars. Her connections with the cast of The Best Man and The Best Man Holiday have reached another level.

“We’ve all known each other so long,” says the actress, 52, of her costars in the 1999 hit and its 2013 sequel: Taye Diggs, Nia Long, Terrence Howard, Morris Chestnut, Harold Perrineau, Monica Calhoun, Melissa De Sousa, and Regina Hall.

“I talked to Nia yesterday. I talk to Regina all the time. Taye and I just DM’ed each other,” Lathan tells PEOPLE. “We don’t hang out all the time, but when we do see each other, it feels like family. It definitely feels beyond friends.”

Lathan starred as Robyn, love interest to Diggs’ Harper. Playing a group of friends reuniting and navigating long-held secrets and shifting relationship dynamics, the cast has “been through so much,” says Lathan — including the unexpected news of a sequel over a decade after the original.

“Who knew?” she says. “That’s a franchise where we were like, ‘Wow, we’re really doing this again?'”

The Best Man Holiday also reunited the cast with writer-director Malcolm D. Lee. Lathan recalls having “so much fun” on the sequel’s set, it may have been hard to stay on track. “I feel for Malcolm because we grew up with him as well. So we’re like, ‘Why do you want us to do that? Explain to me!’ We give him a hard time.”

Bonding with onscreen costars off-screen is a common practice for Lathan. With cast members Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, Uzo Aduba, and more on the set of the new movie The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, “it felt like you’re going to work with family,” she says.

“Russell Hornsby I’ve known for years, Mekhi [Phifer] I’ve known for years,” she adds of her other costars. “We just had a lot of fun in the makeup trailer… I think there’s even some stuff on social media of Russell at 7 in the morning blasting music and just dancing his ass off. It’s like a club up in the makeup trailer!”

The Supremes at Earl’s All-You-Can-Eat, from writer-director Tina Mabry and co-writer Cee Marcellus, is based on the novel of the same name by Edward Kelsey Moore. It is streaming now on Hulu.

Source: Everett Collection, PEOPLE