Jenna Ortega says she sometimes spent an entire day on set without eating or drinking as a child because she was determined not to interrupt anyone or be perceived as a burden.
The 23-year-old actress recalled the habit during a new video interview with Esquire. Asked to identify a rookie mistake from her earliest acting jobs, Ortega initially struggled to think of one before realizing that failing to look after her own basic needs may have been the answer.
Ortega described the behavior as pressure she placed on herself because she was so grateful and excited to be working that she wanted to stay out of everyone’s way.
She began acting professionally at age nine, first appearing in the sitcom Rob before taking early film roles in Iron Man 3 and Insidious: Chapter 2. Recurring work on Jane the Virgin and a starring role on Disney Channel’s Stuck in the Middle followed before Wednesday turned her into an international star.
Ortega Says Not Looking After Herself Was Her Rookie Mistake
Ortega initially told Esquire that she could not remember making a mistake because she had always arrived ready to work. “I really had it going for me as a child ’cause I can’t think of one mistake I made,” she said. “Is that a terrible thing to say?” She explained that her excitement about being on set also made her reluctant to ask anyone for something she needed.
“I wasn’t asking for a sip of water,” Ortega said. “I would go all day without eating, drinking, whatever, because I wanted so badly to not be in the way of anybody.” Looking back, she identified that behavior itself as the problem: “Maybe that was my mistake, was not actually looking after myself.”
When asked whether she wanted to correct any stereotypes about child actors, Ortega offered a deliberately cryptic response. “Is it wrong to say that a lot of them are true?” she said. “And do with that what you will.” Ortega said she was seven when she first announced that she wanted to act. Her parents initially laughed at the idea, which she said only became additional motivation for her to pursue it.
She Refused to Leave Her Wheelchair While Making Iron Man 3
Ortega’s first movie role placed her opposite Miguel Ferrer in 2013’s Iron Man 3. She played the vice president’s daughter, a character missing her right foot, and tucked her leg beneath her dress for the scene. In a separate Esquire profile, Ortega recalled sitting on her leg throughout the workday and then limping back to the car afterward.
“I had sat on my leg all day at work, and I limped all the way to the car with smiles and tears running down my face,” she said. “I was just so happy to have been on a movie set.” Ortega said she also refused to leave the wheelchair between takes because she wanted to be immediately available if the crew needed her. “I refused to leave the wheelchair, because if somebody needed me, I wanted to be ready,” she recalled.
Although Ortega’s spoken lines were cut, the movie’s May 2013 release became a celebration for her family and friends. Her family, several school friends and some of her mother’s emergency-room colleagues went to a multiplex in Rancho Mirage, California, where the film was playing on multiple screens.
Ortega Is Filming Wednesday Season 3 and Has Two Movies Ahead
Ortega is now filming the third season of Wednesday near Dublin, where production has been underway since February. Netflix has not announced an exact premiere date, although Esquire reports that the season is expected later in 2027.
The actress told the magazine that the new episodes find Wednesday Addams and her classmates dealing with the fact that they are now high school seniors, bringing questions about family, adulthood and their futures more directly into the story.
Before then, Ortega will star in Taika Waititi’s adaptation of Kazuo Ishiguro’s Klara and the Sun, scheduled to reach U.S. theaters on Oct. 23. Ortega plays Klara, an Artificial Friend whose hopeful and optimistic outlook offered the actress a deliberate contrast with many of her darker recent characters.
Ortega is also set to appear alongside Glen Powell, Emma Mackey and Samuel L. Jackson in J.J. Abrams’ The Great Beyond. She told Esquire that her character is a lost young person in a new city with a complicated history who forms a connection with Powell’s character. Warner Bros. recently moved The Great Beyond from its original November 2026 release date to Oct. 1, 2027, when the science-fiction fantasy is scheduled to open in theaters, including IMAX and IMAX 70mm presentations.