Jenna Ortega Bonded With Natalie Portman Over Being Treated Like Kids: ‘I Relate to That So Immensely'

Yahoo

29-05-2025

Jenna Ortega said she's grateful for befriending former child stars like Natalie Portman who also know what it's like to be perceived as a little kid – no matter how old you are.
The 22-year-old 'Wednesday' actress told Harper's Bazaar in a new interview that she related 'so immensely' to something Portman, her costar in the upcoming thriller 'The Gallerist,' told her about how child actors get stuck in that phase in people's minds.
'It's always been really annoying, because you just don't feel like you're being taken seriously,' she told the magazine. 'You know, it's like how you're dressed in the schoolgirl costume. … There's just something about it that's very patronizing. Also, when you're short, people are already physically looking down on you.'
She said that becoming friends with Portman, as well as Natsha Lyonne and Winoina Rider, has 'been so beneficial and so cozy… They've seen it all, and, honestly, during a much darker time in Hollywood.
Ortega continued, 'We've all got this jaded way about us that I don't think we'd have if we hadn't started so young and had so many brutal realizations and experiences.' She paused before adding, 'But they turned out all right.'
Portman echoed Ortega's take on their friendship: 'We're both physically tiny, so people will often treat you like a child forever. I'm 43 now, and people kind of pat me on the head. I don't look like a child, but I often feel like I'm treated like a kid. Child actors often cultivate a serious persona because otherwise they'll get treated like kids forever.'
Ortega, whose films include 2022's 'Scream,' 'X'and 'Death of a Unicorn,'said that people, especially on social media, are harder on young women than on young men.
'If [girls] don't stay as this perfect image of how they were first introduced to you, then it's 'Ah, something's wrong. She's changed. She sold her soul.' But you're watching these women at the most pivotal times in their lives; they're experimenting because that's what you do,' she explained.
She may have been referring to incidents such as when 'Spartacus' producer Steven DeKnight her called 'beyond toxic and entitled' for requesting script changes for her Wednesday Addams character in 2023. (He later apologized.) She said she's felt 'incredibly misunderstood' since becoming famous.
'I feel like being a bully is very popular right now,' she said. 'Having been on the wrong side of the rumor mill was incredibly eye-opening.'
'Wednesday' Season 2, Part on which Ortega is also a producer, returns in August.
The post Jenna Ortega Bonded With Natalie Portman Over Being Treated Like Kids: 'I Relate to That So Immensely' appeared first on TheWrap.