{"id":572997,"date":"2026-04-09T02:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-09T02:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/572997\/"},"modified":"2026-04-09T02:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-09T02:28:09","slug":"jenna-ortega-almost-quit-acting-before-you-role","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/572997\/","title":{"rendered":"Jenna Ortega Almost Quit Acting Before &#8216;You&#8217; Role"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\tAlthough she\u2019s considered one of today\u2019s most recognizable leading ladies, <a href=\"https:\/\/deadline.com\/tag\/jenna-ortega\/\" id=\"auto-tag_jenna-ortega\" data-tag=\"jenna-ortega\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Jenna Ortega<\/a> was ready to throw in the towel after her days as a child actor.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\tThe Emmy nominee recently revealed that she nearly quit acting following her 2016-\u201918 run on Disney Channel\u2019s Stuck in the Middle, but booking her Season 2 role as Ellie Alves on <a href=\"https:\/\/deadline.com\/tag\/netflix\/\" id=\"auto-tag_netflix\" data-tag=\"netflix\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Netflix<\/a>\u2018s <a href=\"https:\/\/deadline.com\/tag\/you\/\" id=\"auto-tag_you\" data-tag=\"you\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">You<\/a> convinced her \u201cthere\u2019s no way\u201d she could give it up.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\t\u201cI didn\u2019t know what else I was gonna do,\u201d she explained on Kid Cudi\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/bigbrocudi\/status\/2042016356380635563?s=20\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Big Bro<\/a> podcast. \u201cI\u2019ve never really considered anything else\u2014more-so recently, just out of sake of curiosity and wanting another life experience. But when I was a teenager, I\u2019d gotten off a children\u2019s show, and I didn\u2019t know what I was going to do. I had to prove myself and meet all these new casting directors who didn\u2019t know who I was.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\tOrtega continued, \u201cIt just felt like a good time to call it quits if I was going to. I was starting high school, and, \u2018it was a good run\u2019 sort of thing. We had talked about it for a few months with my team. And then, I think I booked that show You, and then I went on that set and I loved it and had the best time. I thought, \u2018Yeah, there\u2019s no way I could let this go.&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\tIn Season 2 of You, Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) moves from New York to Los Angeles in order to escape the consequences of his murderous ways. Meeting his downstairs neighbor Ellie (Ortega) complicates things as he tries to put the past behind him.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"c-lazy-image__img lrv-u-background-color-grey-lightest lrv-u-width-100p lrv-u-display-block lrv-u-height-auto\" src=\"https:\/\/deadline.com\/wp-content\/themes\/pmc-deadline-2019\/assets\/public\/lazyload-fallback.jpg\" data-lazy-src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/TCDYOUU_ZX004.jpg\" alt=\"\" data-lazy- data-lazy- height=\"683\" width=\"1024\" decoding=\"async\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\tPenn Badgley and Jenna Ortega in \u2018You\u2019 (Beth Dubber\/Netflix\/Courtesy Everett Collection)<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\tThe actress has since found success with roles in the Scream franchise, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, Death of a Unicorn and the title role in Netflix\u2019s Wednesday. She also starred alongside Cudi in Ti West\u2019s 2022 slasher X.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph larva \/\/ lrv-u-margin-lr-auto     \">\n\tOrtega can next be seen in The Gallerist, which premiered at Sundance Film Festival in January, also starring Natalie Portman.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Although she\u2019s considered one of today\u2019s most recognizable leading ladies, Jenna Ortega was ready to throw in the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":572998,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[236,88,26319,217,5467],"class_list":{"0":"post-572997","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-celebrities","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-jenna-ortega","11":"tag-netflix","12":"tag-you"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=572997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/572997\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/572998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=572997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=572997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=572997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}