You could hardly blame Holly Taylor , the 20-year-old actress who plays Paige in the FX series The Americans ( 10 p . m . Wednesdays ) for wondering when she opens the front door in Wayne : Just who might be living next door to me ?

“ I try not tothink about that ,” Taylor says . “ But you never know .”

In the five years since she began , at age 14 , to work on The Americans , she ’ s continued aroutine that would seem familiar to most young people . There ’ s school : first Wayne Hills High School , where she graduated in 2016 , now Kean University inUnion , where she ’ s in her sophomore year , majoring ingraphic design .

There ’ s hanging with friends : favorite spots include the Wayne Hills Diner (“ One of my favorite places to eat ”) and the Outback Steakhouse on Berdan Avenue (“ They have amazing bread , which I ’ m a big fan of ”). There ’ s family life : the regulation mom and dad — Margaret and Mark Taylor — and an older brother , Philip .

All very normal , very routine . But isn ’ t that cloak of normality just what the KGB spies in The Americans hide behind ?

“ The show does make you think ,” Taylor says . “ Especially since this was kind of derived from a true story . What town were they found in in New Jersey ? That actually wasn ’ t too far from here .”

Richard and Cynthia Murphy , alias Vladimir and Lidiya Guryev , were the spy couple in Montclair whose

2010 arrest by the feds helped inspire the acclaimed series by Joe Weisberg , set in the 1980s , and now in its sixth and last season , with the finale only weeks away . During that five-year run , Paige has become an increasingly prominent character , as she ’ s grappled with adolescence , love , religion , and a dawning awareness of her parents ’ unsavory doings .

“ When I first started the show , I had no idea what it would become , and what my character herself would become ,” Taylor says . “ I didn ’ t really know that my character would become anything at all . That was a really pleasant surprise .”

Then too , during the run , the show ’ s premise has acquired a new , urgent topicality — as Russian espionage has gone from a dim Cold War memory to front page news .

“ It has been asurprise to all of us

PARI DUKOVIC / FX

26 MAY 2018 WAYNE MAGAZINE