Today we’d like to introduce you to Catia Ojeda.
Hi Catia, we’re thrilled to have a chance to learn your story today. So, before we get into specifics, maybe you can briefly walk us through how you got to where you are today?
At eight years old, I was cast in my first play: “Robin Hood,” at the local community center in my neighborhood in a suburb of Dallas, TX. (Any other 80s kids remember being “dropped off at the rec center?”) Much to my dismay, I was not cast as damsel-in-distress Maid Marian, but as Prince John, the bad guy. At our first (and only) performance, my disappointment turned into delight because playing the silly villain was getting laughs! Which was way more fun than playing the boring, pretty princess! (This was also a lesson in the disparity in interesting female roles and how shitty it is that so many women are merely accessories to a man’s “hero journey” in the majority of the stories we consume and we need to dismantle the patriarchy, but I probably didn’t fully realize it until I was, you know, older.) After that experience, I was hooked on performing. I was always an imaginative, story-loving kid. I took dance classes, voice lessons, piano, trumpet- and auditioned for every play my parents were willing to drive me to. (Though they wouldn’t let me get an agent until I could drive myself to auditions.) By the time I was in high school, I absolutely knew that acting was what I was meant to do. As soon as I got my driver’s license, I got an agent and started booking local commercials. I did every high school and community theatre play I could. I only applied to acting schools for college and my dream was to go to New York. That’s it. No minor, no backup plan.
I graduated from Marymount Manhattan College with a BFA in Acting in 2002. I waited tables and babysat and started to get some acting work- commercials, small roles on TV shows and TONS of Off-Off (Off-Off-Off-Off, sometimes) Broadway theatre. In 2008, I met a very talented and funny playwright named Alex Goldberg. We married in 2010. By this point, the TV jobs I was booking were getting a little better and the theatre I was doing was slowly losing some off the “Offs.” I was starting to get theatre jobs that actually paid- regional theatre, summer stock, even a big budget touring musical that took me all around the country and ended with a run in Madison Square Garden.
After collaborating together on many theatre productions, Alex and I knew we were good partners in business as well as in life, and we both wanted more opportunities in film and television. Also, my love affair with living in New York City was dwindling. I feel that I need to say this in all caps: I LOVE NEW YORK CITY WITH ALL MY HEART AND I ALWAYS WILL. That’s the truth. But the daily grind of actually living there- tiny apartments, horrible weather, crazy expensive everything, etc.- was just feeling, well, too hard.
In 2011, we’d had some success in New York with a play that Alex wrote and I starred in called “It is Done.” We decided to re-mount the production in Los Angeles and stay for a six months trial period. I absolutely love Los Angeles. First of all, the weather. 13 years of New York City winters and I never got used to it and it always made me miserable. I am half Mexican and spent my childhood growing up in Texas and Mexico so the California weather suits me just fine, y’all. Our production was a success, I signed with agency and started booking a little work, and Alex had a screenplay optioned, so we decided to make the big cross-country leap permanent.
Since landing here in 2012, we’ve rented a few apartments, bought one house, had two children, gotten some jobs, produced our own feature film, and managed to make a living as actors and writers in this weird and wonderful city I now call home.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
Of course not! There is no smooth road. To be a creative person is to deal with constant rejection. To make a living as a creative person involves what feels like an unfair amount of compromise. The marriage of art and commerce is always an uneasy one. The hardest truth about my life as an actor is how very little time I spend acting. Even an audition in these pandemic days- I probably spend more time setting up, shooting, editing and uploading the self-tape than I do working on it in any creative way. Not to mention all the time spent hustling to get said audition in the first place. This business can be absolutely soul-draining if you let it. I always tell younger actors, if they ask for advice, to have a yearly check-in with yourself. Seriously, put the day in your calendar and repeat it every year. Ask yourself, “Is it still worth it? Do I still love it? Do I really want to keep doing this?” For me, the answer has always been yes, but some years that yes came a lot easier than other years.
I’d like to share a story about my “big break:” In July 2014, I achieved what so many of us actors in Hollywood dream of and work so hard for – I booked a major role on a TV pilot. The opportunity came out of the blue- I’d been living in L.A. for only two years and hadn’t had the kind of success I was hoping for, plus I hadn’t even been on an audition in months because I was eight months pregnant at the time! After I was cast, the producers trimmed my character’s role in the episode so that I would only have to work one day since my due date was two weeks away. I was going to have a costume fitting on Tuesday and shoot the pilot on Thursday. Well. On Tuesday morning, I woke up feeling…funny. Different. A little bit sick? Whatever, I was going to shake it off and power through because my costume fitting for the biggest job I’d booked in my life was at 11am and I was not going to miss it and why am I breathing so hard and why do I feel so awful and what is that strange sensation and why am I leaking?! So. I did not make it to the fitting. We went to the hospital instead and at 7:50pm, our beautiful, healthy son was born. 2 weeks early. Obviously, the show had to replace me with another actor and I missed out on the biggest opportunity I’d ever gotten in my career.
The next few months were the hardest of my life. I suffered terrible postpartum depression and anxiety. While I was overjoyed at the arrival of my gorgeous boy who I love with my whole heart, I was also devastated at the loss of the pilot, the kind of thing I’d worked my whole career for. I didn’t know how to honor my feelings about the loss because I thought any “bad” feelings made me a “bad mom.” And society will tell us there’s nothing worse than a “bad mom.” Additionally, the traumatic arrival and birth of my son triggered some trauma I’d experienced in my childhood that I’d been working really hard to suppress. It all came rushing forth and I couldn’t control it. I couldn’t sleep. It was hell. After six months of really suffering, I started seeing a wonderful therapist and taking medication. Very, very slowly, I started to heal. I’m in a good place today.
But wait, there’s a happy ending! This is my favorite part to share because I like people to know that all things are possible. Ten months after I didn’t shoot the pilot, I got a call from my agent. The pilot I didn’t get to shoot was getting picked up and going to series. The producers had some reshoots to do and were re-casting 2 of the major roles. Would I be available to come in for a meeting with them? After weeks of meetings, a screen test and Waiting with a capital W, the role came back to me. It was mine again. We re-shot some of the pilot with new cast (me and another actor) and the show ran for 51 episodes. If you’d like to watch, it’s called JUST ADD MAGIC from Amazon Studios. It’s a family series and I play the mom, Terri Quinn.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I love being an actor and I’ve been fortunate to play all different kinds of characters in theatre, film and TV. But I’m probably best known for playing moms on TV. I’ve played a lot of moms, y’all. My first professional job after college was playing mom to a newborn baby in a Johnson&Johnson commercial and I’ve been momming for a living ever since. I played the mom in JUST ADD MAGIC from Amazon Studios (the big show from my big story earlier), I play the mom on MALIBU RESCUE from Netflix, the mom in Nickelodeon’s LEGENDS OF THE HIDDEN TEMPLE movie, to name a few. I’ve played a few plum non-mom roles, like legendary Tejano music diva Laura Canales in SELENA: THE SERIES on Netflix. My absolute favorite non-mom role is in the dark comedy indie film CLOSURE, written and directed by my husband, starring me, and co-produced together. (For more on our film, check out www.closurefilm.com).
Who else deserves credit in your story?
I would not have any success in my life or career without the love and support of my parents. I’ve had wonderful teachers who pushed me to try harder, to delve deeper. I’ve learned how to be better from getting to observe and work with so many wonderful actors. And finally, my husband, Alex. He is my biggest cheerleader and supporter, and just my perfect partner, in work and in life. I feel like I just gave an awards acceptance speech! You can go to bed now, kids!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.catiaojeda.com
- Instagram: @catiaojeda
- Twitter: @catiaojeda
- Other: www.closurefilm.com
