Searching for Mollen an Exclusive Spotlight on Jenny Mollen

unny, vivacious, insightful, and inspiring are just a few of the words that describe actress Jenny Mollen. And although the final chapter was closed on our heroic vampire, it wasn't before Angel found a little genuine romance. Jenny joined Angel right at the culmination of its series but the impact of her performance and the fans response promptly extended her role as Angel's girlfriend, Nina Ash, werewolf not withstanding. One of the dangers of Hollywood for any aspiring young actress is falling into the cardboard cutout mentality of the industry surrounding them. More often than not, they are considered a commodity, a product in search of a means to communicate their talent. Not wanting to be considered 'just another pretty face', Jenny has set the ground rules on how she wants to be perceived in Hollywood and has proven her strengths by already establishing herself as a writer and producer as well as an actress with very specific ideas about what she wants and doesn't' want to do in the business. But for Jenny, someone with such diverse characteristics and qualities that include a depth of passion for the soul exposed by German literature to a childlike love of comic books and the appreciation of Shakespeare, there is no end to her dedication. Born and raised in Phoenix, Arizona, Jenny attended the University of California Los Angeles's School of Theatre, graduating in just 3-years where she took the following year off to live in Germany and attend the University of Heidelberg. Adding to her unique diversity, she speaks French as well as German, Jenny has an amazing sense of humor and loves to laugh to the point of it being infectious to those around her. She paints, has a love for music and a compassion for the four-legged citizens of this world and a deep devotion to family. And so we go in search of Jenny Mollen, to discover the actress, the artist, the wolf and the creative force behind this talented and lovely young woman. BEGINNINGS, INSPIRATIONS & PASSIONS The University of Heidelberg, Germany While growing up, Jenny's influences and inspirations were just as diverse as her interests and passions are today, even citing Joseph Campbell, an American writer on mythology and comparative religion who gained fame with such works as The Hero with a Thousand Faces (1948), and an examination of the archetype of the hero, The Masks of God. But most of these inspirations came from a reflection within herself and her surroundings. "I think a lot of why I got into acting had to do with the fact that my parents divorced when I was two, and so I was never in a school for more than a year until high school," she explains. "I was back and forth between Arizona, San Diego, Oregon, back to Arizona and I think my always being 'the new kid' in school, feeling like that Grendel figure, I had to become a chameleon and adapt to whatever environment I was in. I really think that's when the acting had started or the root of it; was having to adjust. As a kid, I swear, you just have such resilience you can really get used to anything," Jenny admits. But family played a big part in her life, as dysfunctional as it may have seemed at the time, it gave her a strength that she would carry with her for the next several years. "My parents are both in medicine and I don't know if I thought that maybe that that would be my path just because it seemed only natural," she laughs, "and when I started doing theatre it was just awkward. "French literature was pretentious and florally and that's not my style. I love how gut wrenching and honest German literature can be." Jenny on classic literature It was something I didn't want to tell them about and I thought that they would be really judgmental and not understand because I don't think that I really was happy with myself for wanting to do it. I think I was too concerned with other people's opinions of it and what it sort of looked like and all of the clichés that comes along with it," Jenny confesses. "I was thinking that I was going to be true to myself and the fact that my heart was saying theatre, I was just fighting it every step of the way. Why me? What did I have to do this?" she laughs, "I'm not that girl. I wasn't a cheerleader, I wasn't in a Sorority, I was in Student Government; I just had other agendas. I think when I finally gave in to it my influences were coming from so many different places, from writers that I really admire, musician that I love, painters that I have a lot of respect for. It was an amalgam of a bunch of different influences. I went thru a big Richard Bach (Jonathan Livingston Seagull) phase when I was young, all of Joseph Campbell," laughs Jenny continuing, "I really needed some support because I was really afraid to give into that passion." These are not the only literary influences and Jenny's German roots drew her to the most respected authors of their time with her favorite being Thomas Mann. "I am so obsessed with Thomas Mann. I think he's one of the greatest writers ever. I really love Hermann Hessa; I think Demian is one of the most influential books that's had a big impact on me. I love Schiller, Guenter Grass and Bucher. I think the reason that I really connected with it was because they were just honest about their pain. I feel French literature was just so pretentious and florally and that's so not my style. I love how gut wrenching and honest German literature can be; I think any works of the oppressed is always a good one," she states laughing. With a passion so strong for these writers, one has to expect that Jenny's own personal philosophies for life have been drawn from some powerful thinkers as well. Without even a pause, she offered one who comes to mind, "Kahlil Gibran, 'The passion unattended is a flame that burns to its own destruction,' I use that one," says Jenny. All this may have stemmed from her year abroad, "I studied at the University of Heidelberg and I lived there what would have been my senior year at UCLA. I graduated with my degree in Theatre as a junior (I walked with the class above me) and then I just went there to diversify a little bit more. I felt like I needed to see more of the world. I loved it because [in] Germany you get the greatest deals, I flew to Egypt, I was all over the place so that was fun," she confides with another laugh. The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego Upon her return, Jenny took a step back into time and stretched her acting talents by performing with several famous Shakespeare companies. The Old Globe Theatre in San Diego (modeled after Shakespeare's Old Globe in London) which was built in 1935 to present abridged versions of Shakespeare's plays, the IDYWILD School as well as the renowned Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland Oregon. For most actors, this is where it all begins, "When you're starting out in acting the best training you can get is Shakespeare. It's the hardest work you'll ever do probably and I think it's the foundation for all of it. I feel any actor you talk to is going to say it started with a Shakespearean play. He's the quintessential playwright, you have to be a fan of Shakespeare," she says. "I love Oregon because it's just such a Mecca of great talent and great actors and San Diego to me is sort of my second home so I knew a lot of the people already and it wasn't as foreign to me. Oregon was really like a different world and the city of Ashland itself -- you feel like you are in a little Shakespearean village." Another inspiration from that Shakespearian world is acclaimed actress Emily Watson, who in 1992 took a position with the Royal Shakespeare Company. The 52-year old, British actress may be best known for her performances in Angela's Ashes (1999), Gosford Park (2001), and Equilibrium (2002) but she is one of Jenny's favorite actresses for her portrayal in, "Hilary and Jackie [1998] is one of my favorite films; it's definitely in my top five. I think she's just one of the greatest actress I've ever seen, anywhere. I'm really obsessed with her," confesses Jenny. NOT JUST A PRETTY GIRL While attending UCLA, Jenny wrote, produced and starred in the production of her one-woman show Not A Pretty Girl; an introspective look at her own personal life. "At the time, I was busy getting my Thesis together which was based on: 'Agitation Propaganda in Theater in the Former Yugoslavia,'" she explains. "There was this theater director and he was doing underground theater in Nazi-occupied Poland during World War II. He was also a painter and I was so moved by some of his writings and work that I had seen." After reviewing the upcoming schedule Jenny found encouragement from a friend to push herself like never before. "I saw what the shows were going to be for that season and I thought, 'I don't really have interest in auditioning for any of these plays.' I didn't really like the writers that they had chosen, so I decided, 'I'm going to put up my own show.' It was the one quarter I didn't take 20-units; actually I don't know what I was thinking. But I was talking to my friend Chad, who had been in the Masters program at UCLA, and I was reading him excerpts from my journal and he said, 'Why don't you do a one-women show?' and I was thinking, 'No, I can't, that would be so weird. That would never work out.' He said, 'If I direct it, will you write it and we'll figure it out as we go along?' and I said, 'Alright, I'll take a stab at it.'" And take a stab she did, or rather a more serious slice and dice. "For that whole quarter I sat in front of my computer and typed out monologue after monologue and basically we went thru it, sifted out the ones we liked the best and figured out how they all went together. A lot of it had to do with people's perceptions and how you view somebody from the outside. There's such a story underneath all of that and it dealt with my parents and with growing up, being a child of divorce and how you have to kind of raise yourself. I had a little sister so it dealt with my having to grow up really fast," she explains. Jenny at the Hyperion Convention in London While the challenges of writing such a piece would be daunting enough for most college students, Jenny took on the added responsibilities of producing Not A Pretty Girl but there was still the task of acting it all out, on stage by herself with no supporting cast. "I think the hardest part of it, honestly, was acting. Actually doing your own material can be really hard because when you're writing well, you're writing really honest, painful stuff that you would be embarrassed if someone walked into the room and read. And when you actually have to get up there and say it yourself, people have a hard time understanding that you do take creative [license]; that it's basically not all true. There was enough truth in it -- I actually kept everybody's name the same -- that I think a lot of people left feeling like, 'Oh my god, is that all true? What is true and what isn't true?' and I never really said; I let people think what they wanted to think," she recalls. "As an actor it's hard to be as honest with your own things and issues as you can be when you're locked in a room by yourself putting it down on paper." In hindsight, Jenny found it all to be an unexpected and welcomed catharsis for herself. "Absolutely, it was probably one of the most rebellious things I've ever done in my life. They told me that Tim Robbins was the last person they knew that was so gutsy who had been to UCLA and kind of broke all the rules and did their own thing, so I took that as a compliment, but I was sort of walking a tight rope there for sure." With only an emotional net beneath her, Jenny quickly took her newly acquired experience and reassurance to another level. Go to Next Page

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