DeKnight, a well-known Hollywood producer and filmmaker, blasted ‘Wednesday’ star Jenna Ortega by calling her as ‘entitled’ and ‘beyond toxic’.
DeKnight strongly criticized the on-set behavior that Ortega shared during an episode of Dax Shepard’s podcast “Armchair Expert”. Ortega admitted to acting in an “unprofessional” manner during the production of the Netflix show and even changed lines that “did not make sense.”
The producer took to twitter to write that he loves “talking with actors about their lines/stories,” but sometimes the actors “don’t have the full pictures (in TV) of where the story is going and why some lines are needed for the whole to make sense.”
“She’s young, so maybe she doesn’t know any better (but she should),” he explained in a twitter thread. “She should also ask herself how she would feel if the showrunners gave an interview and talked about how difficult she was and refused to perform the material.”
“This kind of statement is beyond entitled and toxic. I love her work but life’s too short to deal with people like this in this business,” he added.
In a Twitter discussion with other users, DeKnight, who has experience working on shows like “Daredevil” criticized Ortega’s actions as “highly unprofessional”. He expressed his belief that actors should handle their concerns privately behind the scenes rather than publicly criticize the writing on a podcast.
“In this business, it’s extremely bad form to throw your collaborators under a creative bus,” he stated.
What did Ortega say?
The controversy started when Jenna Ortega made a guest appearance on Dax Shepard’s Armchair Expert Podcast on March 6, 2023. During the interview, the 20-year-old actress was candid and outspoken about the quality of the scriptwriting, which she believed was not up to par.
“I don’t think I’ve ever had to put my foot down on a set in the way that I had to on Wednesday because it’s so easy to fall into [the teen] category, especially with this type of show. Everything that she does, everything that I had to play did not make sense for her character at all. Her being in a love triangle made no sense,” she shared while on the podcast.
The star even added, “There were times on that set where I even became unprofessional in a sense where I just started changing lines.”