Jenny Slate found a brand new sense of purpose and confidence filming Carousel after the drama surrounding 2024’s It Ends With Us.
“I believe what I discovered in myself during this shoot was renewed gratitude for the mix in my personality that’s shyness and hopefulness that becomes this strange, gregariousness that feels so good to have,” Slate, 43, told Deadline on Saturday, January 24, during an appearance on the 2026 Sundance Film Festival. “It just feels so good to be that way.”
She continued, “I believe I also upped my confidence or my sense of legitimacy and the worth of myself as a dramatic performer.”
Slate stars as Rebecca in Rachel Lambert’s upcoming romantic drama, Carousel, where her character reconnects with highschool boyfriend Noah (Chris Pine).
“I don’t really associate myself with stillness and even patience, although I try for patience,” Slate admitted to Deadline of the differences between herself and her character. “I’m unsure that I’m exactly able to, like, what most individuals would consider stillness, but I believe of Rebecca as a far more still person than I’m.”
In keeping with Slate, she’s not just like her character in real life.
“I don’t think I’m really like Rebecca in any respect, apart from that I would like love and a partner and I hold onto love,” she told the outlet.
Before filming Carousel, Slate worked on the now-infamous film, It Ends With Us. The 2024 movie was adapted from Colleen Hoover’s best-selling novel, chronicling a pair, Ryle (Justin Baldoni) and Lily (Blake Vigorous), in an abusive relationship. Slate appeared as Allysa, Ryle’s sister and a detailed friend of Lily’s.
Several months It Ends With Us’ summer 2024 premiere, news broke in December 2024 that Vigorous, 38, sued her costar and director Baldoni, 42, for alleged sexual harassment, fostering a hostile work environment and attempting to spoil her fame.
Baldoni vehemently denied the accusations, while the pair’s former It Ends With Us costars have publicly declined to take sides.
It Ends With Us’ star Jenny Slate and book writer Colleen Hoover were reportedly deposed as a part of Blake Vigorous and Justin Baldoni’s ongoing legal drama. People reported on Friday, October 17, that multiple members of the film production were called in for depositions. Included in that list were Hoover, 45, Slate, 43, and Isabela […]
“I don’t have anything to say about that,” Slate told The Hollywood Reporter in March 2025 when asked to check working on It Ends With Us to her Dying for Sex miniseries. “All the pieces is its own thing. I poured my heart into this work, and each minute of [Dying for Sex] was necessary to me, and I just wish to speak about that.”
She continued, “Anyone can ask anything, but my only responsibility is to talk in regards to the work I’m there to advertise. It was so necessary to me to get this job, so why would I spend time talking about anything but that?”
Because the legal battle continues, a judge unsealed a handful of text messages from the It Ends With Us crew earlier this month. In court documents obtained by Us Weekly, Slate allegedly told her team where she stood with Baldoni after the film shoot.
“Hey guys — I don’t wish to do anything with Justin, I don’t wish to speak about him, like … nothing,” Slate allegedly wrote in a June 2023 text. “I’m just unsure how visible I would like to be on this [press] campaign, and searching over this list, I’m wondering if actually we SHOULD wait a beat. What’s Blake going to do?”
In follow-up texts, Slate claimed that Baldoni was the “biggest clown and probably the most intense narcissist” and that the whole production shoot felt “really gross.”
“I’m one in every of many who feel [this] way,” she sent in a text.