‘Mythic Quest’ actress Jessie Ennis on Brie Larson’s new season podcast – WWD

When Jessie Ennis launched into Hollywood, after graduating from Sarah Lawrence College Liberal Arts, she hardened herself for disappointment and reality, knowing full well how rare success in Hollywood can be.

“Almost every job I’ve had, I’ve gone out for another role and they’re like ‘actually you could be better at that other thing’,” she says. “I audition knowing full well that rejection is much more common than booking work. “

After graduating from college, Ennis made a deal with herself. She would spend four years auditioning as many as possible and trying to meet as many casting directors as possible and if she still hadn’t booked a position, she would pivot. The backup plan, however, was a bit loose: she never really forced herself to envision a world without acting, as she has been on a “war path” to becoming an actress since childhood.

Fortunately, a career in interior design wasn’t necessary to explore: Ennis, at 29, has appeared on some of the most acclaimed comedy shows of the past decade, from “Veep” to “Better Call Saul,” and is now seen on “Mythic Quest,” in a role that was written just for her. She also co-hosts a podcast with her best friend Brie Larson called “Learning Lots,” which began during the pandemic and also serves as a planned BFF time where the pair, who are bonded by a shared curiosity, get to pepper those in the know. fascinate them. questions. Overall, it’s been going pretty well for Ennis so far.

Ennis was born in Boston but moved to Los Angeles when she was two because her father, actor and comedian John Ennis, wanted to try Hollywood. The family packed their bags and drove across the country in a Volvo station wagon after a friend of his father’s promised him he could get him a job writing for a TV show. But by the time they arrived, the show had been canceled. Even though she was just a toddler at the time, the tale of Hollywood’s fickleness and haste imprinted on her as she continued to grow up in LA.

“It was a very realistic experience for me as a kid,” she says. “My parents didn’t have a lot of money, so I went to auditions with my dad all the time and that was a really helpful example because I had a realistic understanding of what an actor is. sometimes that means you don’t get the job you were really well prepared for, and sometimes that means you’re working on something you picked yesterday, and all these little ideas through my dad’s career really got off. ‘helped with mine.

Her father was on the ’90s HBO show “Mr. Show with Bob and David,” and David Cross actors, Mary Lynn Rajskub, and others hung out in his house throughout his childhood.

“For me, normal was adult men wearing wigs and doing silly things,” she says. Since life at home was much more active than the idea of ​​kindergarten, young Jessie was rather reluctant to leave behind time spent with David Cross for the classroom. The solution?

“My mom found a way to bribe me into going to school by putting me into acting class on Saturdays,” she says.

Ennis landed “Mythic Quest” after auditioning for every female role, before being called to the table to read a role written just for her.

“I really like that she doesn’t care what people think of her,” she says of her character, Jo. “It’s fun playing a problematic character.”

The series had been in production for three days during the second season when it was shut down for the pandemic, resuming five months later under tight security.

“The uncertainty shared between us really brought us together. There was this magnetic fold to have some semblance of community, ”she says. “It was a bonding retreat that you can’t find anywhere.”

She likens “Mythic Quest” to a “training camp you get paid to attend.”

“I introduce myself, I can play in these amazingly well-written scripts, but in addition to playing this character that I love in a series that I’m actually a fan of, I was invited to the writers room, I have got access to watching dailies. We got to watch the editing process, which was incredibly helpful. And Rob let us go with him as a director as well, and then I got to direct towards the end of the season. ” , she says.

With the season over, she’s hard at work on a new project as well as the podcast, which was not meant to be a “pandemic podcast” but was a saving grace for her and Larson.

“One ingredient in the recipe for why we get along is that we’re both really curious. We’ve been going through these crazy adventures for a decade now and so there was all this opportunity to share this with people and welcome those who wanted to join us and open up the conversation to be bigger. We can invite friends as well as strangers and experts and learn from them, so it’s really fun, ”she says. The two have been friends for over a decade, having met at the Williamstown Theater Festival during a production of “Our Town” and bonding over the fact that they accidentally showed up in matching outfits on several days.

“It was kind of that kindergarten thing where you’re like ‘Do you want to be my friend?'” Said Ennis.

Her dream podcast guest is Miley Cyrus, but in the meantime, she’s just as thrilled with the guests they’ve booked so far (she cried when Amy Poehler agreed, though, as Larson pointed out, Poehler is one of Ennis’ mentors).

“Sometimes I’m amazed that everything is going well,” says Ennis. “Sometimes I wake up and I’m like ‘wow, everything is still happening.'”

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