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Jenna Ortega takes her coffee exactly how you would imagine: “Black,” she says declaratively, wrapped in a gray hotel robe with perfectly mussed bedhead. “Just black. I can do espresso, Americano; depending on the weather, maybe I’ll put some ice in it. But when I’m home, it’s coffee before I go to the bathroom to brush my teeth.”
And caffeine she needs. It’s an early morning in London s Westminster neighborhood, eight hours ahead of home on the West Coast, and the start of what’s about to be a busy press tour for season two of Netflix and Tim Burton’s Wednesday. Throughout the five-city tour, all of Ortega’s beauty looks—created by makeup artist Melanie Inglessis and hairstylist Cesar Deleon Ramirez—have one thing in common: a secret. The actor, who is a Dior makeup ambassador, has been road testing the house’s new lipstick, Rouge Dior On Stage. The pigmented shades are meant to last 24 hours, so it feels only right that we hang for the day. (Sadly, no pillow talk reveal forthcoming.)
As we sit down to start a room service feast of unusual sorts (hummus with crudité, fruit), Ortega tells me she’s “really not a morning person.” That’s when we both hear a shriek from outside the hotel suite window, and I realize we’re across from the King’s Guard and their famous biting horses. “Even if I wanted to, I just wouldn’t make sense. I think I would identify with those biting horses.”
It’s time to get ready for a busy day—Wednesday isn’t going to promote itself—and the 22-year-old bestows me with total control of the aux cord to “set the vibe.” This is a task I would never volunteer for under normal circumstances, let alone with people I don’t know, so the pressure is even higher. I want to appear tasteful and cool, but then Ortega delivers the kiss of death when it comes to my music tastes: no pop. Wracking my brain, I search the room for inspiration and land on my tote bag—a piece from the now shuttered Vampire’s Wife brand, founded by Brit-goth cool girl Susie Cave. Her husband, Nick, is a musician. Bingo. “Great choice,” she confirms as the first beats of “Into My Arms” start to flow through the speakers. “I saw him in concert earlier this year. Susie is a real-life Morticia.”
Ortega first fell in love with the world of Tim Burton when she saw Mars Attacks!, which came out six years before she was born. “Sarah Jessica Parker on a Chihuahua changed my life,” she says while getting ready in the bathroom. “It was the first film I remember seeing and wondering, What is this world?”
Ortega’s outfit is a peek into one of Paris Fashion Week’s most anticipated debuts: Jonathan Anderson’s first women’s show at Dior. The look is a knit striped sweater paired with a white skirt and pumps marked by tiny black bows. The skirt is adorned with small shells carved into a garland of lily of the valley flowers. The final touch is a swipe of lipstick, Rouge Dior On Stage #550, a classic red. “A red lip isn’t a casual thing for me, though I wish it was,” she says after touching up her Cupid’s bow. “Naturally, I gravitate toward a nude lip because it’s safe and consistent. But a red lip feels like armor. It’s a statement.”
The flowers on Ortega’s skirt gently hit against each other as she swishes around the room, making a musical sound. It’s a nod to Mr. Dior, who was famously superstitious and often wore the lily of the valley tucked into his suit pocket.
“I don’t really have something lucky that I carry around with me,” Ortega reflects after hearing about Mr. Dior’s own superstitious past. “But I have pretty intense OCD, so I’ve had the exact same routine for seven years. I count to a certain number in the shower. I put my clothes on in a certain order. If I’m having a bad day and I don’t know why, it’s because I put the wrong sock on the wrong foot. I’m very aware of stuff like that. And while it may come across as silly, and I can acknowledge that, it also brings me some sort of comfort.”
If this were a dream weekend night back home, Ortega says the evening would start with a long walk. “I’d want to spend some time in a park or a cemetery,” she says. “I might want to see a show at the theater, then meet some friends at a bar and have a couple of drinks. They could do dinner after, but maybe I would just go home and read.” Right now, she’s toting around Equus, the 1973 play by Peter Shaffer about a child who has religious ideations about horses. “I prefer to read plays in between jobs because they are a bit easier,” she adds.
When it comes to her own work, there’s not a character—neither Wednesday Addams nor Beetlejuice Beetlejuice s Astrid Deetz—that has influenced her own unique beauty look. “I’ve been on jobs where I’ve thought, Oh, I really love this lip color. But when I try to wear it afterwards, I can’t, because all I see is the character,” she tells me as our time together draws to a close. “I am in a great phase of exploration in my life right now, and I don’t want to feel married to any one thing. When you have the opportunity to play, why don’t you?”
In this story: Styling, Enrique Melendez; makeup by Mélanie Inglessis; hair by Cesar Deleon Ramirez; manicure, Chisato Yamamoto.
