Not to be confused with Jamie Lee Curtis.
Jaina Lee Ortiz (born Jessica Ortiz; November 20, 1986) is an American actress and dancer. She is known for her starring role as Detective Annalise Villa on the Fox police drama Rosewood from 2015 to 2017. In 2018, she began starring as lead in the ABC drama series Station 19.
Early life
Ortiz was born November 20, 1986 in California and raised in The Bronx, New York. Ortiz’s father, Joe Ortiz, is Puerto Rican and a retired NYPD first grade detective. She began her dance training at the age of nine by taking salsa/mambo classes; and, at the age of 15, she began teaching. By the next year, Ortiz was traveling internationally as a professional instructor and performer.
Ortiz started acting by appearing in student films. She studied for two years at Maggie Flanigan Studios, where she learned the Meisner technique.’
Career
In 2009, Ortiz auditioned and was cast on the second season of VH1’s reality show Scream Queens, where she and nine other aspiring actresses competed in challenges based on acting for the opportunity to win the prize of a role in Saw 3D. The show premiered on August 2, 2010 and on the season finale, Ortiz was named first runner-up.
In 2012, Ortiz was in a photo used in the Modern Family episode Yard Sale where she was beauty pageant contestant Miss Galapa.
In 2013, Ortiz landed the role as a series regular in The After, produced by The X-Files creator, Chris Carter. The pilot, which began airing via Amazon Video in February 2014, received positive feedback and was ordered to series. [10] [11] However, on January 5, 2015, Amazon Studios canceled the show. Two months later, Ortiz was cast as the female lead in Rosewood on Fox. Rosewood ran for two seasons. In 2017 she had a recurring role during the second season of USA Network drama series, Shooter. Ortiz appeared in the comedy film Girls Trip, playing herself.
In 2017, Ortiz was cast in a leading role on the spin-off to ABC’s longest-running drama series Grey’s Anatomy, titled Station 19. In 2023, Ortiz starred in the thriller film Righteous Thieves and in the historical drama film The Long Game.
Jaina Lee Ortiz, Star of ‘Station 19,’ Tries Her Own Stunts
The actress Jaina Lee Ortiz isn’t normally drawn to high-adrenaline pursuits. Her favorite hobby: flower arranging. Her idea of bliss: neatly folded towels. Her dream job: personal organizer.
And yet on a snowy Wednesday, Ms. Ortiz clambered 40 feet up in the air, clutching handholds and scrambling onto footholds as she climbed the rock wall at Chelsea Piers.
“It’s fun, it’s really fun,” she called out. Then she reached the top and dared to look down. “Oh wait,” she said. “It’s scary.”
Ms. Ortiz, 31, has been scaring herself a lot lately. She plays a firefighter named Andy Herrera — the series lead — on “Station 19,” which had its premiere on March 22. The show is a spinoff of “Grey’s Anatomy,” and the latest from creative force Shonda Rhimes.
Andy risks death in pretty much every episode. A trained salsa dancer and a natural athlete, Ms. Ortiz has usually done her own stunts for other roles. But the punishing heat, the 70-pound turnout gear and the bodily risks mean that in this show, she mostly leaves the leaping-out-of-the-window action to the professionals.
“You go do your thing,” she tells her stunt doubles. “I’m going to be over here drinking my water in this air-conditioned room.”
Andy, no towel folder, goes rock climbing to relax. So this is one stunt that Ms. Ortiz wanted to try herself. After a busy morning making the publicity rounds, she arrived at Chelsea Piers Fitness Center in glitzy makeup, glossy ponytail and black boots with lollipop heels.
Ms. Ortiz hadn’t packed workout gear, but at the front desk she bought a no-nonsense Under Armour set — black shirt, black leggings.
Andy moves through the world with confidence and dignity, “like Wonder Woman,” Ms. Ortiz said. Ms. Ortiz didn’t move so differently as she strutted in those heels past the weight machines, the basketball courts and the beach volleyball sand pit, until she arrived at the climbing wall. Matthew Carter, a fitness instructor and a climbing guide, handed her a pair of thin-soled red shoes.
Once Ms. Ortiz had switched them out for a larger size, Mr. Carter helped her into a climbing rig that looked a little like an S-and-M harness (“We are in Chelsea,” Mr. Carter said with a deadpan) and watched as she tightened it around her waist and thighs. Then he tied on a woven pouch filled with gymnastic chalk.
After all that firefighter gear, the harness felt like nothing. “It’s soothing,” Ms. Ortiz said.
The wall looked like a hunk of moon face topped with sprinkles. Ms. Ortiz studied it warily while Mr. Carter uses a carabiner to hook her to a rope anchored at the wall’s top. She gripped the first handhold, and a minute and seven seconds later she had reached the top. “That was too easy for you,” Mr. Carter said after she descended.
Ms. Ortiz said, “You think so?”
He had her go up using only the green holds and then only the blue ones. She was brisk and methodical, her ponytail swinging as she maneuvered for each new hold. Mr. Carter shouted approval as she moved her legs into a wide split. Later she switched up her feet and rebalanced herself on the wall. “Stylish,” he called.
“Now I see why my character would do that,” Ms. Ortiz said, having bounced back down to earth and chugged some water. “It’s like therapy. It’s like meditation.”
“Moving meditation,” Mr. Carter said. He pointed out that it also builds up forearm strength.
Strength is what Ms. Ortiz projects, on the climbing wall and off it. It’s what casting agents see. Still, it’s not always what she feels. She has played a rookie cop, a detective, a Marine and now a firefighter — “public-service, badass characters,” she said.
