Jenna Ortega bought a Flip phone to get off the grid amid the fame
“I don’t want to feel like a walking billboard, which is a very, very scary feeling,” the “Scream VI” star said.
Jenna Ortega goes old school to stay grounded.
The “Scream VI” star has been filming back-to-back projects like “Wednesday” and “X,” but now Ortega wants a break from outdated technology.
“There’s one month this year that I want to take off and I’ve made it very clear that I’m going to take that month off. I’m going to travel, I just got a flip phone, I’m just going to hide for a while,” Ortega said. Elle cover story. “I have to work around my schedule to make sure that month stays open. There’s a part of it that’s stressful because it’s like, “Oh my God, can I tell this director that I don’t want to work these two weeks? I know?’ I don’t know, but I also make the rules.”
The “Stuck in the Middle” alum previously detailed how “devastated” she was about not returning for “You” Season 4 due to conflicting production schedules. Ortega still struggles with being in such demand as an actress.
“If I really wanted to make movies and play characters or direct and write soundtracks, I could do it all in my backyard. I don’t need to do it on such a large scale,” Ortega said. “But at the end of the day, all the other extras that come with my job sometimes feel like it’s almost not worth it. I don’t want to feel like a walking billboard, which is a very, very scary feeling because then you feel less and less in control of your life. I feel like I have seen or know many people who have succumbed to this pressure. I don’t want to belong to anyone or anything.”
Ortega continued: “I’ll see someone on the street and it’s pretty annoying because I feel like I’m infected. My job has given me a virus where I can’t function without picking up on what everyone else is doing… I want to live up to people’s expectations, which I have to exceed, but I’m also afraid that, I don’t know, maybe someone is too you’ll get to know me and realize that I’m not like that.”
The former Disney Channel child star admitted: “The kind words people say about me through other people are unbelievable to me. I feel like only the people in my life see me in a way that I don’t really see myself… I’m so afraid of disappointing the people in my life or even the public.”
According to the actress, however, Ortega is selective about projects and refuses roles like “the sidekick who carries the Puerto Rican flag on his shoulders and makes it his whole personality.”
Ortega recently spoke about why playing “smart” teenage characters is unattractive, as it perpetuates unpleasant teen stereotypes on screen.
“I feel like it’s always the ‘cheeky teen,’ the ‘foul-mouthed teen,’ or a lot of times the ‘intelligent,’ which I don’t think is true,” Ortega shared. “I think it’s hard too, these days when this new language comes out, but I feel like my generation because there’s so much available to them online, there’s just more opportunities to learn. I wish they would get a little more credit. We can be clever sometimes.”
Ortega previously said, “I really see my younger generation taking more control of themselves in the industry — whether it’s learning to write sooner, directing sooner or producing sooner. I think it’s really empowering and important because right now teenage voices are still being spoken by older white men. The more it happens, the more we recognize that girls are so much more than a lame stereotype.”
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