Why Jenna Ortega couldn’t bat her eyelashes while playing Wednesday Addams

For Jenna Ortega it was not at all easy to wear the gloomy clothes of Wednesday Addams after interpretation by Christina Ricci who made the character iconic. And yet, the young actress convinces the majority and the new series Netflix, is enjoying enormous success.

No detail is left to chance and the most attentive viewers have caught one in particular: Wednesday hardly ever bats her eyelashes.

Jenna Ortega revealed the total intentionality of the thing, studied at the table with director Tim Burton. The latter wanted as much as possible to be faithful to the mannerisms of little Addams and, one of the expressions he aspired to to achieve this, was the “Kubrick-like” look: chin down, eyes peering up between the eyebrows and muscles of the face take it easy. Style The Shining and A Clockwork Orange so to speak (two trifles for nothing in short).

Tim Burton: «As a teenager I was an outcast like Wednesday Addams»

Imagine having to remember the jokes, interpret them at their best and not being able to give your eyes even a few thousandths of a second of natural rest. Ortega admitted that it wasn’t child’s play at all and the undertaking was made even more difficult by the cold and wintry Romanian windwhich put a strain on his tear duct.

But there is a trick: bat your eyelashes when it’s the costars’ turn to say their lines. Sure, you’ll catch some of her imperceptible blinks in the series but, she’s gotten so good at keeping her eyes wide open, that you’ll feel like a keen observer every time you manage to notice the “mistake”.

If you needed an excuse to re-watch, here it is: count Wednesday’s blinks for each episode. The result may surprise you.

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