Jenna Ortega says she will probably take a TV break after Wednesday eventually ends, though the comment is considerably less dramatic than a retirement announcement. The 24-year-old actor still has several film projects in development, so Hollywood need not begin lowering the flags.

Speaking on Josh Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused podcast, Ortega said she had not been involved in many discussions about joining other franchises.

“But what I’m meant to do will come and find me,” she said. “I think after Wednesday, I’ll probably be off the TV for a while.”

Ortega explained that she spent much of her childhood moving between television productions and now wants room to try something different.

“I was bouncing from show to show as a kid, this to this, and I want to leave time for new things,” she said.

She is leaving room for films, not leaving acting

Ortega’s wording matters. She said she would “probably” step away from television “for a while” after Wednesday finishes, not that she plans to quit acting or leave the Netflix series after its third season.

Her current workload points firmly towards a shift into film. Variety reported that she is developing a movie with Taylor Russell, preparing for the gymnastics drama Nasty alongside Rose Byrne and remains attached to J.J. Abrams’ The Great Beyond.

That would continue a film career that already includes Iron Man 3, The Fallout, X, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice and Death of a Unicorn. Television, meanwhile, has occupied Ortega since the early 2010s through roles in Jane the Virgin, Stuck in the Middle, You and eventually Wednesday.

She has also spoken about the strain of working from a young age. Earlier in 2026, Ortega recalled going an entire day without eating or drinking while on set as a child actor. In another podcast conversation with her X co-star Kid Cudi, she said she nearly abandoned acting before landing You.

“It just felt like a good time to call it quits if I was going to,” she said of that earlier period.

Wednesday remains a very large commitment

Ortega plays Wednesday Addams and serves as an executive producer on the series, giving her a larger role behind the camera than she had when the show began. She stars alongside Catherine Zeta-Jones as Morticia Addams, Luis Guzmán as Gomez Addams and Isaac Ordonez as Pugsley Addams.

Production on Season 3 finished on September 30 after filming around Dublin and Paris. Netflix has not announced a release date, despite reports claiming the season will arrive in 2027.

Winona Ryder, who appeared with Ortega in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, joins the third season alongside Eva Green, Chris Sarandon and Noah Taylor. Green will play Aunt Ophelia and has said she hopes to bring her own “touch of cuckoo-ness” to the character. Showrunners Alfred Gough and Miles Millar have promised more Addams family secrets, because this family apparently still has cupboards left to open.

The show remains one of Netflix’s biggest properties. The company said in 2025 that Season 1 had surpassed 350 million views, making it its most-watched English-language series. Variety reported that the first four episodes of Season 2 attracted 50 million views in five days, while the complete season entered Netflix’s all-time Top 10.

Ortega told Horowitz she initially thought the series was not working and remains “a little confused” by its success. Four Emmy wins and hundreds of millions of views have not entirely resolved the mystery.

Her franchise choices have changed before

This is not the first time Ortega has reconsidered a major franchise. She appeared in Scream and Scream VI before leaving the horror series ahead of Scream VII.

In a 2025 interview with The Cut, Ortega connected her departure to Melissa Barrera’s firing after Barrera expressed support for Palestine during the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza. She also cited the absence of directors Tyler Gillett and Matt Bettinelli-Olpin from the next film.

“The Melissa stuff was happening, and it was all kind of falling apart,” Ortega said. “If Scream VII wasn’t going to be with that team of directors and those people I fell in love with, then it didn’t seem like the right move for me in my career at the time.”

Her latest comments suggest a similar preference for choosing projects rather than collecting franchises. For now, she remains attached to Wednesday, with Season 3 completed and no confirmed premiere date.