Jenna Ortega Creates a Sculpture of Herself

Vanity Fair

"She just told me that I just need to approach everything that I do in life with the confidence of the average white man." 'Wednesday' actress Jenna Ortega gets real and personal as she creates a sculpture of herself. From the first performance she saw that made her want to become an actor to some great advice she received from a mentor, hear Jenna break down all the things that make her who she is today. Does she always feel pressure to say the "right" thing? How does her public persona differ from her private self? What type of people does she like to spend time with?   Director: Mateo Akira Director of Photography: Chaimuki Editor: Matthew Colby Talent: Jenna Ortega Producer: Madison Coffey Line Producer: Romeeka Powell Associate Producer: Lyla Neely Production Manager: Andressa Pelachi Production Coordinator: Elizabeth Hymes Camera Operator: Francesca Amoroso Gaffer: Matthew Bohun Audio Engineer: Michael Panayiotis Production Assistant: Motunrayo Soyannwo, Emmet Michael Banahan Set Designer: Phoebe Swiderska, Oliver Bacon Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin Post Production Coordinator: Scout Alter Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen Assistant Editor: Andy Morell

Transcript

00:00Can I be completely honest?

00:01Cause I just chose clay

00:02cause I haven't touched clay in like 12 years,

00:04but I think you guys may have overestimated my abilities.

00:08Oh, I'm going to figure it out.

00:09But just so you know,

00:11I like, I don't, I don't even know what that means.

00:13Hi, my name is Jenna Ortega.

00:22And today I'm going to attempt a self portrait with clay.

00:30Who is this metal man?

00:32Who is it?

00:33Yeah, what does he do?

00:36This is my guy.

00:38Here we go.

00:46I had to have been six or seven.

00:48My parents weren't home.

00:49They were doing either at work

00:51or back to school night or something.

00:52So my older sister was watching me

00:54and she was watching the movie Man on Fire

00:56with Mark Anthony and Dakota Fanning and Denzel Washington.

00:58And I saw young Dakota in that movie.

01:01Her performance made me so emotional

01:03and I felt so invested in her character and her story

01:06and what happened that it made me want to do that.

01:08Her performances were always so mature.

01:10She felt like a grown woman trapped

01:12in this tiny, you know,

01:14sweet little girl's body and mind and imagination

01:17that I think I was just captivated by her.

01:20She was so fascinating.

01:21And as someone who was close to my age,

01:22I just kind of clung onto her

01:23because I thought she was the coolest.

01:25When my parents came home, I told them, I said,

01:27you know that movie Man on Fire?

01:29And they said, why were you watching Man on Fire?

01:31And I said, I'm going to be the Puerto Rican version

01:35of Dakota Fanning.

01:36And then they laughed.

01:37And then we all went to bed and forgot about it.

01:39Or at least they did.

01:40And then I just kind of harassed them for years and years

01:42until they let me do it.

01:47I think my mom gave me this monologue book

01:49to kind of shut me up

01:50because she did not want to take me to LA

01:51to join this crazy business.

01:54I memorized so many of those

01:55just to show my parents that I was invested

01:58and that I was willing to work hard

01:59and make something real and tangible

02:00out of this interest of mine.

02:02Started watching a ton of movies, a ton of shows,

02:04things that maybe were even out of my depth

02:06because I was so fascinated and curious

02:08and wanted to sound like I knew what I was talking about.

02:10I think I almost became an actor out of spite

02:13because they didn't take me seriously.

02:16So I showed them and I was lucky enough

02:18to fall in love with it and have this connection with it.

02:21But yeah, whenever they came home from school,

02:23it was reading the book.

02:28I used to say that I wanted to be a nurse.

02:32I have siblings who are entering the medical field.

02:33My mom was an ER nurse all her life.

02:35I need something to be obsessed with.

02:37I would love to be an investigative journalist

02:40where you just kind of delve into what's going on

02:43in the world and being able to inform people.

02:45It's a job that never gets boring,

02:48kind of like what I do now.

02:49That or maybe a historian of some sort

02:51where I just randomly know a lot about something

02:55that other people probably wouldn't think twice about.

02:58To me, there's nothing more attractive

02:59or enticing about a person than someone who speaks

03:02on something that they're really passionate about.

03:03And you learn a lot from those people.

03:07This is a meat man.

03:08I'm sorry, this is so ugly.

03:09It's like he's just a meat man.

03:15The show that I do right now, I have to play the cello

03:17and I don't play the cello and I want it to look real

03:20so that cellists don't look at it and call me mean names.

03:23My teacher told me that as long as I looked confident

03:26in my movement and I was strong and stoic

03:28and fully embodied the character, that it would be fine.

03:30And she told me that I just needed

03:32to approach everything I do in life

03:34with the confidence of the average white man.

03:36And that changed my life.

03:38I feel better.

03:40I was nervous to even do this because I ramble like crazy.

03:44So I was like, man, what am I gonna talk about

03:46for all this time?

03:47And then I just remembered,

03:48how would an average white man do this?

03:50And he probably would have shown up with mismatched socks.

03:57I just feel like a lot of things are sound bites now.

04:00People's attention span is,

04:01I feel like it's rapidly decreasing.

04:03And I don't know if that's just because scrolling

04:05and TikTok, I think that's what we all say.

04:07And that's kind of what we assume.

04:08But I think a lot of times when you do an interview now,

04:10people are just waiting for that one bite

04:12or the one headline.

04:13And the things that they ask you to touch upon

04:15are often trends and viral clips and moments

04:18and things that, yeah, sure, it's fun to acknowledge

04:20and appreciate and talk about,

04:21but I feel like the internet doesn't know when to quit it

04:25or when to drop something.

04:26And then when they do drop something, it's brutal.

04:28It's just very sheep mentality, bandwagon mentality.

04:31And I feel like people oftentimes

04:32don't even read a full interview anymore.

04:34They read a tweet of something that somebody said

04:37that probably is misworded.

04:39And then it's that.

04:42I don't know, it's just very hostile.

04:45It's a new time.

04:50Yeah, especially because I'm a rambler.

04:52I feel like I have all of these different trains

04:54of thought going on in my head at all times.

04:57I'm terrified to see everything that I've said written down

05:00because it makes no sense.

05:01So much of my job is socializing

05:03and communicating with people

05:04that I forget to do that with myself.

05:06I get fearful of the way that I interact with people

05:08because I leave a social interaction

05:09and I think, oh man, I didn't even sound like myself.

05:11And it's like,

05:12you don't even know what yourself would sound like.

05:14Writing is very informative for me in that way.

05:18I think when I write, oftentimes,

05:21I just get to come up with the best version of myself.

05:23Everything is cleaner.

05:24It's more to the point.

05:25I have a better vocabulary.

05:27I was on like an hour flight to get here

05:28because I didn't have reception or anything

05:30for this hour flight.

05:31I read through this journal that I've had for the past year.

05:33And I was so fascinated because it was my life,

05:36but it almost was from a different perspective.

05:38It almost didn't feel like mine.

05:39So it felt like I was meeting someone again.

05:41And I think that that's wonderful as well,

05:42to have documentation of how you're changing

05:45and growing as a person.

05:46It's the first time I've actually really looked back

05:48at my writing and been grateful

05:50and appreciative towards myself for taking the time

05:52and making that a priority.

05:58I'm starting to feel adjacent to myself again.

06:00I think there was a time where my life went

06:02through such a transformative experience

06:03that I felt very lost.

06:05I didn't have enough time to connect with myself.

06:07I felt like an image of myself was being projected

06:11that I didn't resonate with.

06:13It's very easy for me to become very pessimistic

06:15and in my head and negative about things.

06:17And I've kind of seen my language become more constructive

06:21rather than harmful.

06:23I don't think I would have picked up on that

06:24or been able to appreciate that

06:25had I not had that written down and documented.

06:29He kind of, on accident, is looking like one of the aliens

06:32from Mars attacks, I think.

06:34I never said he was going to be pretty.

06:36And I actually think he's more interesting if he's not.

06:43Oh, I forgot that I could use this.

06:46With the character that I do or the jobs that I play,

06:49everything is very dark and horror, comedy.

06:54And I think that oftentimes people think

06:56that that's what I'm like.

06:57And don't get me wrong, I love dark humor.

06:59I love the jobs that I work on.

07:00They're so much fun and entertaining for me.

07:02But I think people would probably be surprised to know

07:05that I'm a little bit...

07:09I don't want to do an interview and go,

07:11I'm silly or anything like that.

07:13But I don't think I'm as intense

07:16as maybe I always come across, which is fine.

07:20I think because the character Wednesday

07:21has been such a thing, which I'm so, so grateful for

07:24and is so incredible and entirely unexpected,

07:26I think oftentimes people just see me as that.

07:32I don't know what makes me unique.

07:34I think that's kind of somebody else's job.

07:37No, it's not.

07:38I guess you kind of have to figure that out for yourself.

07:40Just took my nail off.

07:43Don't look.

07:46I've got my Wednesday nails on under here.

07:48I think we're just going to set this to the side

07:51and not worry about it.

07:52I appreciate how curious I am.

07:54I do think I ask a lot of questions.

07:56I'm very, very analytical about things

07:59and I feel like I'm more interested in observing

08:02and taking in and being aware of what's going on around me.

08:06Sorry, this man, he's dying on me.

08:09Yeah.

08:15Right now I'm reading books that are around my job

08:18that I'm doing right now.

08:20I brought Frankenstein, I brought Dracula,

08:22I brought all of the darker books that I have.

08:25I have like A Clockwork Orange,

08:26but I'm currently reading a music reviewer named Mark Fisher

08:29who I'm just learning about.

08:30I don't know, he just speaks about his opinions

08:32and views on things and somehow ties it to these artists.

08:35I went into the bookstore trying to get capitalist realism.

08:38They didn't have that book, but they had his last book.

08:44Just having a moment.

08:48Or this guy.

08:50I love to run and I used to love to run while I was younger.

08:54I get to, I get to put all my energy towards that

09:00or have some sort of endorphin release based off of that,

09:03which is incredible and amazing and really exciting.

09:07I want to wrap this guy up.

09:09I can give him nice little pants and bows and things.

09:12Did I say that I can't multitask?

09:14Because I can't.

09:19I think you're cooler if you're weird.

09:20I think it's probably better to exercise

09:23any sort of self-expression whenever you can,

09:25even if that means walking down the street

09:28and if you want to walk in a zigzag, walk in a zigzag.

09:30We're creatures of habit and routine

09:32and if you're able to break that

09:34and remind yourself that you have free will

09:35and can do whatever you want,

09:37I think that that's really beneficial.

09:38That's labeled as weird, even though it's not really weird,

09:41because whatever societal standards

09:43or whatever is trending or important online

09:46tells you otherwise and I think that that's so lame

09:50and if we all look the same and sound the same,

09:52then we're screwed.

09:54My friend told me to make a bowl and I should have,

09:57but now we have this guy.

09:58I think he has a story.

09:59I think he has a background.

10:00I think he's a survivor.

10:01I should have been more considerate towards this man

10:03and I wasn't and what are you gonna do?

10:07He's got a little bow.

10:10His arms go like that.

10:12There you go.

10:13There's your meat man.

10:16And his name is, we're gonna go with Gerkenberger.

10:19He came here today.

10:21He dressed well and put himself together

10:24and put one foot in front of the other

10:25and I think he's a great role model for young people today

10:28because with any sort of belief in yourself

10:30or any sort of ambition or drive,

10:32despite your hardships,

10:34you could end up in a 45 minute long

10:36self portrait of Vanity Fair interview.

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