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One of the most talented young actresses in Hollywood turns 22 today! To celebrate the already amazing career of Jenny Ortega, check out a gallery of our favorite photos of the child prodigy.
Jenna Marie Ortega was born in Coachella Valley, California. Ortega showed interest in acting at the age of six. After her mother posted a video of her performing a dramatic monologue on Facebook, Ortega hired an agent and started to get auditions. In 2012 she made her acting debut with a guest appearance on the CBS sitcom
Rob followed by an appearance on
CSI: NY later in the year. She made her film debut in 2013 when she portrayed the vice president’s daughter in the superhero film
Iron Man 3. Over the next four years, she voiced and acted in shows that garnered her more recognition including
Insidious: Chapter 2, Jane the Virgin, Stuck in the Middle (nominated for Best Young Actor at the Imagen Awards) and
Elena of Avalor.
Ortega received a nomination for Best Lead Actress at the Southampton International Film Festival for her role as Dawn in the film
Saving Flora in 2018. She was then cast as Ellie Alves on the second season of the wildly successful Netflix thriller
You. Ortega continued showing that she was a versatile force over the following years. She was lauded for her performances in slasher film
Scream (2020), the drama film
The Fallout (2021) and horror film
X (2022). Between 2021 and 2022 she starred in three other horror films (
The Baby Sitter: Killer Queen, Studio 666 and
American Carnage) also, garnering the title of a scream queen by countless media outlets.
When the Netflix comedy horror series
Wednesday was released in 2022, Ortega became an undeniable household name. She played the titular role of Wednesday Addams, a fictional character from the
The Addams Family franchise. In the series, Wednseday is expelled from her school for unruly behavior. Her parents end up enrolling her at their high school alma mater, Nevermore Academy. While trying to manage her new life, Wednesday discovers she has inherited her mother’s psychic abilities, which allow her to solve a local murder mystery. The show was immediately a huge success. Within three weeks of being released,
Wednesday became the second-most watched English-language Netflix series ever. Ortega’s performance garnered her nominations at the Golden Globe (Best Actress in a Television Series – Musical or Comedy), Primetime Emmy (Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series) and Screen Actors Guild Awards (Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Comedy Series). At the beginning of 2023, the hit show was renewed for a second season. Ortega then reprised her role as Tara Carpenter in
Scream VI, which was released in March of last year. The film was released to similar success as the previous one. This year, Ortega was a cast member of the recently released
Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, the sequel to
Beetlejuice and the second film of the
Beetlejuice franchise. At just 22 years old, Ortega has already established herself as a prominent actress that will be around for decades to come. We can’t wait to see what’s next for her. HAPPY 22ND BIRTHDAY JENNA!
