Sometimes even work feels like home for “Landman” star Paulina Chávez.
Take a tender scene in the hit Paramount+ series in which her character, Ariana Medina — a recently widowed young mother with an infant son — reminisces about her late husband with her new love, oil field worker Cooper Norris (Jacob Lofland).
As Cooper flips through a photo album in Ariana’s home, he comes across her wedding pictures. When he asks her where she got married, Chávez all but breaks the fourth wall when Ariana says San Antonio, “I think maybe the most magical city in the world.”
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Call it acting naturally. After all, the longtime San Antonian considers herself a proud River City homebody.
“We’re all homebodies, which is nice,” Chávez said of herself and her family, who moved to San Antonio from El Paso when she was 6 years old.
Soon, Fort Worth will be home for Chávez as she starts shooting Season 3 of the Taylor Sheridan drama about the West Texas oil boom.
It’s a long way and a long drive from Sky Harbor Elementary, where Chávez first fell in love with acting at age 7. Those South Side school productions soon led to television and film auditions. After minor roles that included playing a young Kim Kardashian, Chávez landed her big break as the title star of the Netflix comedy series “The Expanding Universe of Ashley Garcia,” later titled “Ashley Garcia: Genius in Love.”
Chávez has since starred in family films such as 2020’s “Feliz NaviDAD” with Mario Lopez and 2025’s “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Road Trip” with Eva Longoria, as well as the 2023 sports drama “The Long Game.” These projects showcase her acting range and Mexican American heritage while allowing her to embrace the responsibility of being a Latina role model.
Which all comes back to where she feels most at home: in San Antonio con familia. Here’s her perfect day in that magical city.
“I am not a morning person so I would probably get out of bed around 10 a.m. on a good day,” Chávez said. “And I would probably end up getting ready to go for brunch. I’m a big brunch person.”
Mike Sutter/San Antonio Express-News
Right now, Chávez’s favorite place is Box St. All Day, the all-day brunch restaurant and coffee bar that rolled out from a food truck and catering company to three San Antonio locations. Chávez would roll with the flagship spot at 623 Hemisfair Blvd, Suite 108.
Mike Sutter/San Antonio Express-News
Did Chávez mention she loves Pearl?
“I think the Pearl is one of the best parts of San Antonio,” she said. “I like walking around the Pearl. It’s such a great location.”
Chávez’s perfect Pearl stroll would include a macha latte at Local Coffee, drinking in the reads at the nearby Twig Book Shop, then a scoop of whatever is seasonal at Lick Honest Ice Creams, such as Back Porch Iced Tea. Sweet, of course.
“From (Pearl) I would end up going to one of my friend’s Pilates classes in Alamo Heights called Pilates Platinum (5310 Broadway) and make sure she kicks my butt,” Chávez said. Then it’s some kettlebell flow with her boyfriend, Wesley Beans, a personal trainer.
“It’s a mixture of strength training, yoga and mobility,” Chávez said. “It also works out the brain. It’s kind of like a dance almost.”
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Paul Stephen/San Antonio Express-News
All that exercise works up an appetite, specifically for raw fish marinated in citrus juice. Cue a quick ceviche run to El Cevichero Restaurant y Cantina at 1023 Cupples Road near Brooks City Base.
“I normally pick that up to go and I eat it at home,” Chávez said.
Chávez combines her favorite food with her favorite company watching one of her favorite television shows. Right now it’s “Lioness,” the Sheridan spy thriller starring Zoe Saldaña that just kicked off its third season. Or maybe it’s a rewatch of ABC’s “Scandal” starring Kerry Washington. Then everyone chips in to do the dishes.
Chávez then turns her screen time to the Nintendo Switch for some “Boomerang Fu,” a video game where players control food and fruit characters armed with boomerangs.
It gets a little intense. OK, a lot intense.
“Even playing with my mom and my partner we’re very competitive,” Chávez said. “We had to retire from playing against each other to just play in teams against the bots. Because we were just yelling at each other. Now we’re just yelling at the bots and it’s a little bit more healthier.”
After a quick shower, Chávez shifts game night to the tabletop with a classic dominoes game of Mexican Train with music. Then it’s off to her new favorite pastime.
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Chávez takes her glow-up of Act II Butter Lovers microwave popcorn even more seriously than she does her digital boomerang fights with her loved ones.
“It’s a very special recipe that I make,” Chávez said with a laugh. “I basically top my popcorn with lots of butter, parsley, cayenne pepper and fresh Parmesan cheese, then chop it with Cholula. And that’s my little night snack.”
Her extra ingredients are so special they even got her a shoutout on social media. She recalled recently getting a message from a “Landman” fan who was behind her in line at an Orlando airport when security scanned her carry-on and gave her back her cherished extra butter.
“My excuse is I’m deficient in a lot of vitamins and butter is really good for that,” Chávez said. “And I was like, oh yeah, now I’m just known for being the butter girl.”
“I’m a night owl,” Chávez said, “so I would probably end up watching TV till very, very late and go to bed around midnight.”
“That’s the perfect day for me,” she added. “That’s basically every day for me, honestly. Every day is a perfect day I guess.”
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Reporting by René Guzman. Production by Lillian Vest. Editing by Jan Waddy. Powered by the Hearst DevHub.
Aug 28, 2026|Updated Aug 28, 2026 9:58 a.m.
René Guzman writes about all things San Antonio, from past and present to pop culture and puro cultura. He can be reached at rguzman@express-news.net.
Before joining the Express-News in 1998, the San Antonio native co-owned a college humor magazine called Bitter, for which he wrote, designed and edited, as well as distributed at various campuses and businesses citywide. His features writing has appeared in the Houston Chronicle, San Francisco Chronicle, Seattle Post-Intelligencer and Times-Union.