Jenna Ortega Joins The Addams Family In Netflix's "Wednesday" — Here's Everything We Know About The Show So Far
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The Addams Family is back, baby! And this time, they're kookier than ever.
Netflix's new series Wednesday follows a teenaged Wednesday Addams as she goes off to boarding school on her own and navigates the mysterious and spooky world of high school.
And if you're anything like us, you'll be ready to watch the series as soon as it drops. So, in the meantime, here's everything we know about the series so far after its panel at New York Comic-Con (including some fun lil' behind-the-scenes stories from the cast and creators):
1.Wednesday has eight new episodes that will all drop on Netflix on Wednesday, November 23.
2.Tim Burton directed the series, so it'll automatically be extra spooky. The show's creators and writers, Alfred Gough and Miles Millar, were initially told by others that Tim wouldn't sign on to direct, as he "doesn't do television." This show will officially mark his TV directorial debut.
Days after sending over the script to his agent, Tim personally called the duo.
At New York Comic-Con, they said, "His agent called and said, 'Tim loves the script, he felt like he would have dated Wednesday Addams in high school. He'd really love to get on a Zoom or a call,'" Alfred said. "We're like, 'Great. How do we set that up, through his assistant?' He goes, 'No, I'm gonna send you Tim's phone number, and you're gonna FaceTime with him tomorrow morning.'"
3.Jenna Ortega, who will star as Wednesday Addams, said she was initially approached by Tim Burton to take on the role.
Their meeting consisted of a 10 to 20-minute conversation, where she read a "couple of scenes."
"I don't think I've ever played a character that's been done before, before. It was an interesting balance. We've also never seen her as a teenager, which was a cool endeavor," Jenna said. "I felt very, very lucky. And also, I can't think of many iconic characters that have reached as wide of an audience as Wednesday, who's also Latin. It's a great honor."
4.Luis Guzmán will play Gomez Addams, and he said that his initial response to being told that Tim wanted to talk to him was to say, "Tim who? The guy from the Batman movies?"
"He says, 'I would love for you to be my Gomez.' And I say, 'I would love for you to be my Tim,'" Luis joked.
5.Wednesday will be attending Nevermore Academy, aka the "safe haven" for outcasts, "no matter who or what they are."
Coincidentally, it's the same school where her parents first met and fell in love.
6.Catherine Zeta-Jones will be playing Morticia Addams, and Luis joked that the "passion" between him and Catherine came "very easy" to him.
"I have the most beautiful wife as Gomez. It was great working with Catherine. She's beautiful, and I got to kiss her at the end of all the takes," Luis joked. "I've been doing this a long time — she still taught me tricks about the camera. It was an honor to work with her."
7.Gwendoline Christie will play a new character, Larissa Weems, Nevermore's headmistress and Morticia's former roommate.
"It was just a surreal experience. I've wanted to work with Tim Burton my entire life," she said. "For there to be this filmmaker that created films about the outsider, someone that I felt I could really connect to, that understood me...I play a headmistress at a school for outcasts, which many people have said I have been typecast in this role. Larissa went to Nevermore, her roommate was Morticia, and Morticia was always brilliant at everything — she superseded all expectations, she excelled at everything, and Larissa was always in her shadow."
She added, "Now that Larissa has achieved her dreams of being in charge of the school, she has to deal with not only the bureaucracy as a woman in power of trying to navigate that, but the arrival of Wednesday Addams."
8.Fred Armisen will be playing Uncle Fester, and he did indeed shave his head for the role.
"I wanted to do it right and not have a bald cap or anything," Fred told the NYCC audience.
9.Former Wednesday Addams Christina Ricci will also appear in the series as Ms. Thornhill, a staff member at Nevermore.
10.The series was shot over eight months in Romania.
"We worked really, really hard on the show — eight months in Romania, away from our families, really trying to create something that did Wednesday Addams justice," Jenna said. "[We wanted to] create a new world and introduce her to a newer generation while also welcoming back other people that have fallen in love with her from previous generations."
11.Alfred and Miles' teenage daughters served as inspiration for the series.
"We have teenage girls — four between us," Miles said. "I think what's amazing about Wednesday [is that] she's an iconic character for many reasons, but she is someone who was fully formed and incredibly confident."
12.And finally, the show isn't a remake or a sequel, but a totally new iteration of The Addams Family.
At New York Comic-Con, Alfred Gough and Miles Millar explained that the series isn't a remake but a totally new iteration of The Addams Family. Miles said, "The next iteration of [The Addams Family] feels like it's honoring the past, while still making something different and new. So, it's not like a museum. It's very close. It's not a remake. It's an eight-hour Tim Burton movie."
