How to split a string into a list of characters?

How do I split a string into a list of characters? str.split does not work.

"foobar"    →    ['f', 'o', 'o', 'b', 'a', 'r']

>>> list("foobar")
['f', 'o', 'o', 'b', 'a', 'r']

Use the list constructor.