Jenna Ortega admitted she felt completely lost while filming one of Netflix’s biggest shows ever. The actress revealed her surprisingly rocky start with legendary director Tim Burton on the Wednesday set and explained why she believed the show wasn’t working.
Wednesday’s Jenna Ortega felt she wasn’t clicking with Tim Burton
Jenna Ortega revealed on the Happy Sad Confused podcast that she struggled to connect with director Tim Burton during the first season of Wednesday. The actress admitted she doubted the show’s potential due to their initial communication gap.
“I didn’t think that it was working at all,” Ortega said of the Netflix series. She attributed part of that feeling to Burton’s reserved nature on set. “Tim is very, very shy,” she explained. “He’s opened up a bunch, but when you initially start working with him, he does not speak.”
Ortega recalled that Burton would whisper notes to costume designer Colleen Atwood rather than address her directly. She now understands he was trying to be sensitive around a young actress. “It was things like that that just felt like, ‘OK, well I’m not clicking with him. He’s not speaking to me,’” she said. Burton also wanted to give her space as a performer to find the character herself.
The experience weighed heavily on Ortega, who was 17 at the time and filming abroad. “To be, you know, 17, 18, in a foreign country with this very big director and feel like I wasn’t connecting… I was very stressed out,” she shared.
When the show premiered in 2022 and became a global hit, Ortega found the reaction baffling. She revealed that Netflix sent her early episodes, but she could barely watch them. “I couldn’t make it through the first five minutes, 10 minutes,” she confessed. “I was mortified.”
The actress joked that the show’s success felt like “some sick mind game” and called it an elaborate prank. “That’s still to this day, I am a little confused,” she added. However, after three seasons, Ortega now feels settled. “That crew, the people, everything about it, they’re so lovely and kind and work so well together,” she said.
