Jenna Ortega, 21, breaks silence on age gap backlash over ‘awful’ movie romance with Martin Freeman, 52
Jenna Ortega is defending the age gap with her “Miller’s Girl” co-star Martin Freeman.
The 21-year-old actress addressed her controversial on-screen romance with Freeman, 52, in an interview with Vanity Fair published Tuesday.
“Miller’s Girl,” released in January, chronicles the inappropriate relationship of teacher Jonathan Miller (Freeman) and his student, Cairo Sweet (Ortega).
“It’s not supposed to be a comfortable movie,” Ortega said. “It’s supposed to be awful at times.”
“Art isn’t always meant to be pleasant or happy, and everyone skips off into the sunset at the end,” the “Wednesday” star continued.
“We all have f–ked-up experiences at one point or another.”
The erotic thriller sparked major backlash due to the 30-year age gap between its lead stars.
“This Jenna Ortega/Martin Freeman film is so gross! So, so, so, so gross!” a fan said on X (formerly Twitter) after the film came out earlier this year.
“That jenna ortega martin freeman clip might b the worst thing i’ve ever seen,” another fan said.
A third tweet read, “MARTIN FREEMAN WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO JENNA ORTEGA.”
Freeman spoke out about the backlash in April, saying that the uncomfortable relationship between his and Ortega’s characters was the point of the movie.
[“It’s] grown-up and nuanced. It’s not saying, ‘Isn’t this great?’ ” he told UK’s the Times.
“And that’s a shame,” he went on. “Are we gonna have a go at Liam Neeson for being in a film about the Holocaust?”
The movie’s intimacy coordinator, Kristina Arjona, also addressed the controversy in February, and claimed Ortega was “comfortable” on set.
“There was many, many people throughout this process, engaging with [Jenna] to make sure that it was consistent with what she was comfortable with, and she was very determined and very sure of what she wanted to do,” Arjona told the Daily Mail.
She explained that she always checked in on Ortega and Freeman and made sure their “boundaries [weren’t] being surpassed.”
Arjona added that the actors had “simulated sex scenes,” in which they used modesty garments as “additional barriers” to ensure that there was an “appropriate distance” between the two.
The stars were able to “change their minds” about doing a certain “element” in an intimacy scene on the day of if they so wished, too.
“Miller’s Girl” is directed by Jade Halley Bartlett. Dagmara Domińczyk, Bashir Salahuddin, Gideon Adlon and Christine Adams round out the cast.
The film made less than $900,000 on a $4 million budget at the worldwide box office.
It has a 29% critics score and 42% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes.
