Jenna Ortega said in a new interview with Harper’s Bazaar that she was “an unhappy person” in the aftermath of Netflix’s “Wednesday” becoming a global sensation and blowing up her acting career to newfound heights. The show’s first season is the streamer’s biggest English-language series of all time with 252.1 million views. And it’s not even close, as “Stranger Things 4” is in a distant second place with 140 million views.
“To be quite frank, after the show and trying to figure everything out, I was an unhappy person,” Ortega said. “After the pressure, the attention — as somebody who’s quite introverted, that was so intense and so scary.”
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Ortega became an overnight sensation despite acting since she was a child, and such popularity put a target on her back on social media as her every move and all of her next acting choices were dissected and picked apart. The actor said she felt “incredibly misunderstood” when she reached the height of fame.
“I feel like being a bully is very popular right now,” Ortega said. “Having been on the wrong side of the rumor mill was incredibly eye-opening.”
Ortega told the publication that the overwhelming success of “Wednesday” is a double-edged sword. There are the pros, like being able to play the cello and having new interests: “I definitely feel like I have a bit more Gothic taste than I did when I was a teenager. I’ve always been into dark things or been fascinated by them, but I was a Disney kid, and the whole thing is being bubbly and kind and overly sweet.”
But there are also some cons: “I’m doing a show I’m going to be doing for years where I play a schoolgirl. But I’m also a young woman.”
Ortega said she is aware that playing the character of Wednesday will limit what the industry thinks she can or can’t do as an actor, which is why she quickly signed on to star in a handful of elcectic movies after the show’s first season wrapped (A24’s “Death of a Unicorn,” “Hurry Up Tomorrow” with the Weeknd, Taika Waititi’s “Klara and the Sun,” “The Gallerist” with Natalie Portman). As a child star who is now trying to be an adult star, Ortega said “you just don’t feel like you’re being taken seriously.”
“You know, it’s like how you’re dressed in the schoolgirl costume,” she added. “There’s just something about it that’s very patronizing. Also, when you’re short, people are already physically looking down on you… girls, if they don’t stay as this perfect image of how they were first introduced to you, then it’s ‘Ah, something’s wrong. She’s changed. She sold her soul.’ But you’re watching these women at the most pivotal times in their lives; they’re experimenting because that’s what you do.”
Ortega said she is “very grateful” for the global fandom she has acquired because of “Wednesday,” which is why she’s trying her best to navigate a career that tailors to both her fans and her own tastes.
“I want to be able to give back to them. But I also want to do things that are creatively fulfilling to me,” she said. “So it’s finding that balance of doing movies that they might be interested in and then doing movies that I’m interested in. [I want roles that are] older and bolder and different. And then I want to be able to line up all of my girls and see something different in all of them.”
“Wednesday” Season 2 will release in two parts on Netflix starting Aug. 6 and ending Sept. 3. Read Ortega’s full Harper’s Bazaar cover story here.
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