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Jenna Ortega, 21, says her mother kept her safe as a child actor by keeping a close watch whenever she was on set.
In an interview with The New York Times published over the weekend, the “Wednesday” star spoke about navigating Hollywood as a child star.
Ortega told The Times that she didn’t watch “Quiet on Set,” but her mother did and “called me about it.”
“I think for her, it was more pain, because she had seen the way that other children maybe weren’t protected or weren’t as looked after,” Ortega said about her mother’s reaction. “She watched over me like a hawk, so I think for her, it was more empathizing and wishing she somehow could have done something to help.”
Ortega added that her mother called to say she was grateful that things were OK for her and that she had been present to witness everything on set.
“Quiet on Set” is a docuseries about the toxic work environment on Nickelodeon shows under Dan Schneider. It is based on an investigation published by Business Insider’s Kate Taylor in August 2022.
In the docuseries, “Drake and Josh” star Drake Bell revealed that he was the previously unnamed minor whom dialogue coach Brian Peck was charged with sexually abusing in 2004.
Ortega started acting at age 9 and gained prominence after her role as Harley Diaz on the Disney Channel show “Stuck in the Middle,” per her IMDB page.
While Ortega says she was fortunate to be shielded from any misconduct or harassment when she was younger, she acknowledged that “child acting is strange.”
“I see why my parents felt so hesitant about it, because you’re putting a child in an adult workplace,” Ortega said. “Children aren’t supposed to be working like that. They are supposed to be climbing trees and drawing and going to school.”
The actor said she was really “fortunate” to have parents who made sure she had a fairly normal childhood and “wouldn’t allow me to work on a job unless I had straight A’s and was prioritizing my sleep and my schoolwork.”
During a recent conversation on The Times’ “The Interview” podcast, Ortega also opened up about how she deleted her X (then known as Twitter) account after receiving explicit AI-generated images of herself as a child.
“Did I like being 14 and making a Twitter account because I was supposed to and seeing dirty edited content of me as a child? No. It’s terrifying. It’s corrupt. It’s wrong,” she said.
A representative for Ortega did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent outside regular business hours.
