Jenna Ortega said she hopes to star in more slasher films after playing gothic character Wednesday Addams.
The 20-year-old star of new Netflix series Wednesday, a murder-mystery series based on The Addams Family, also said she is hoping to take on more “jobs that excite” her.
The first series of Wednesday, which stars Catherine Zeta-Jones as Morticia Addams, Luis Guzman as Gomez and Isaac Ordonez as Pugsley, follows Ortega’s character as she tries to master her emerging psychic ability, thwart a killing spree terrorising the town and solve a 25-year mystery involving her parents.
Getting ready for the Thanksgiving Day Parade. pic.twitter.com/lVZDbgDjoH
— Wednesday Addams (@wednesdayaddams) November 23, 2022
In an interview with The Face, cover star Ortega, who also played Tara Carpenter in slasher flick Scream earlier this year, said of her future: “I would hope I’m doing jobs that excite me. I think I’d tend to go down the more dramatic indie route.
“Maybe a good slasher or two in there. I’d like my jobs to be diverse.
“If I reach some sort of widespread genre collection, that would be exciting for me – and that’s if I continue acting.”
Wednesday, produced by Edward Scissorhands filmmaker Tim Burton, also stars Christina Ricci, who played Ortega’s character in the ’90s films The Addams Family and Addams Family Values.
Ortega said Christina is the “coolest” but she found it really “awkward” meeting her for the first time.
She added: “Sometimes I’d say things and she’d go, ’Ooh, uh, that’s… dark.’ Things like that.
“I didn’t know how to handle it. Since then, we’ve talked and had really great conversations…
“She was super professional, super sweet, knew everyone’s names. We never talked about Wednesday once.”
Ortega said working with Burton was “incredible” but called him a “man of very few words”.
She said: “He was very intense and meticulous. He’d never done TV before… He knew everyone’s names (but) he was very quiet and (kept) to himself.
“He excused himself if he felt he was in the way.”
The interview was done by Disney’s High School Musical: The Musical: The Series star Olivia Rodrigo, who asked Ortega about funny times when fans come up to her.
Ortega, who was in Disney series Stuck In The Middle, said: “My strangest ones are from our Disney days, where I’d go to the restroom and someone would talk to me from underneath a stall.
“Or when I was washing my hands and someone grabbed me by the arm and took me to their son’s birthday party. And you don’t have enough of a backbone to say no!”
She also said she grew up “very fast” – with people calling her an “old woman” when she was eight.
The latest issue of The Face is out now.