Jenna Ortega opened up to Vogue magazine as part of a new cover story about her nonexistent relationship to how the public receives her movies. In other words, the “Wednesday” star does not watch her own movies or read reviews (because “that would send me into a psychosis of some sort’) or check the box office updates when her team sends them her way (because “I don’t want it to become a numbers thing”).
For most of her movie career, Ortega would rely on social media to gauge the chatter around her projects or to find out how much word of mouth existed around a certain project. But she’s even doing less of that these days since she’s on social media “less and less” because “so much of what you see on there nowadays is just garbage AI,” plus “we all look at ourselves too much.”
Ortega told Vogue that she recently broke her phone and didn’t even bother to get it fixed for a few days so she could be without social media and technology at her fingertips. She explained: “If I needed to get somewhere, if I had a workout class, I would look at a map on the computer, memorise the streets. If somebody needed me, I’m like, ‘Well, I’m gonna be at this café at this time.’ And that was so freeing.”
Ortega is gearing up for the release of her movie, the Taika Waititi-reviewed “Klara and the Sun.” Reviews have not been kind to the movie, which is adapted from the Kazuo Ishiguro novel of the same name. Variety panned the film as “calamitous” and a “strained, whimsical comedy that’s ruinous.” The movie currently boasts a 27% on Rotten Tomatoes and is only tracking for a box office debut in the $2 million range despite a $20 million production budget. Fortunately for Ortega, she will stay clear of the reviews and the box office grosses.
In a separate interview on the “Happy Sad Confused” podcast, Ortega got more reflective about her television career. She currently headlines Netflix’s blockbuster series “Wednesday,” which is heading into its third season on the streamer. Ortega got her start on TV when she debuted at 9 years old on “Jane the Virgin” and went on to find Disney stardom on three seasons of “Stuck in the Middle.” Whenever “Wednesday” finally comes to an end, Ortega will be taking a TV break.
“What I’m meant to do will come and find me,” Ortega said. “I think after ‘Wednesday,’ I’ll probably be off the TV for a while. You know I had many years doing [TV]. I was bouncing from show to show as a kid and I want to leave time for new things.”
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Read Ortega’s full Vogue cover story here. “Klara and the Sun” opens in Australian cinemas today.
From Variety US