Aubrey Plaza Opens Up About Passing of Her Husband For the First Time
PARK CITY, UT - JANUARY 19: Actress Aubrey Plaza (L) and director Jeff Baena attend "The Little Hours" premiere during day 1 of the 2017 Sundance Film Festival at Library Center Theater on January 19, 2017 in Park City, Utah. (Photo by George Pimentel/Getty Images for Sundance Film Festival)
Actress Aubrey Plaza spoke about the loss of her husband, Jeff Baena for the first time. Plaza opened up about the loss on the podcast Good Hang with Amy Poehler. The two, who are good friends, starred together on the show Parks and Recreation.
“You had this terrible, terrible, tragic year. You lost your husband. You’ve been dealing with that, and you’ve been looking for all different ways in which to feel and find support. On behalf of all the people who feel like they know you, and the people who do know you, how are you feeling today?” Poehler asked.
Plaza paused and told Poehler that she felt like she was living in a “very, very present moment” and that she was “happy to be with” her. “Overall, I’m here and I’m functioning. I feel grateful to be moving through the world. I think I’m okay. It’s like a daily struggle, obviously,” she added, before comparing her mental state to the plot of the movie The Gorge.
“It’s an alien movie with Miles Teller. In the movie, there’s a cliff on one side and a cliff on the other side, and a gorge in between that’s filled with monster people trying to get them,” Plaza explained. “I swear when I watched it I was like, ‘That feels like what my grief is like,’ or what grief could be like. At all times, there’s a giant ocean of awfulness that’s right there and I can see it. Sometimes I just want to dive into it and be in it, and sometimes I look at it. Sometimes I try to get away from it. It’s always there, and the monster people are trying to get me — like Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy.”
The pair went on to discuss other things for a while, before Poehler asked Plaza what makes her laugh. Plaza answered that her closest friends.
“We have a text chain, we do Zooms and trips, those girls make me laugh really hard,” Plaza said. “We’ve known each other for so long. That’s the best thing that makes me laugh, all my funny friends.”
Plaza’s husband died by suicide in January of this year. The two had been together since 2011 and married in 2021.
You can watch the full episode of Good Hang with Amy Poehler and Aubrey Plaza below:
If you or a loved one are struggling or need emotional support, there is help available, no matter what country you’re in or language you speak. Visit the International Association for Suicide Prevention for more information.