NEED TO KNOW
- Aubrey Plaza opened up about dealing with grief during an appearance on her friend Amy Poehler’s Good Hang podcast
- Plaza’s husband, Jeff Baena, died by suicide in January of this year
- “Overall, I’m here and I’m functioning. I feel really grateful to be moving through the world. I think I’m okay, but it’s like a daily struggle,” the actress told Poehler in the episode released Aug. 19
Aubrey Plaza is speaking out about dealing with grief following the death of her late husband, Jeff Baena.
During an appearance on the latest episode of her friend Amy Poehler’s Good Hang podcast, Plaza, 41, was asked how she’s doing after her husband Baena died by suicide at age 47 on Jan. 3 of this year.
After Poehler, 53, mentioned that Plaza’s dog, Frankie, had been acting as The White Lotus star’s “therapy dog,” the podcast host continued, “Just to get it out the way, people want to see you and want to see how you are, they love you.”
“You’ve 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,” Poehler, who starred on Parks and Recreation with Plaza between 2009-2015, added.
“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, to which Plaza responded, “Right in this very, very present moment, I feel happy to be with you.”
“Overall, I’m here and I’m functioning. I feel really grateful to be moving through the world. I think I’m okay, but it’s like a daily struggle, obviously,” Plaza continued.
The Agatha All Along star went on to compare grief to the 2025 movie, The Gorge, starring actors including Miles Teller and Anya Taylor-Joy.
Plaza told Poehler, “This is a really dumb analogy and it was kind of a joke at a certain point, but I actually mean it. Did you see that movie The Gorge?”
“It’s like [an] alien movie or something with Miles Teller. In the movie, there’s like a cliff on one side and there’s a cliff on the other side, then there’s gorge in between and it’s filled with all these like monster people that are trying to get them,” she added.
Plaza continued, “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 like a giant ocean of awfulness, that’s like right there and I can see it. Sometimes I just want to dive into it, and just like be in it. Then sometimes I just look at it, and sometimes I try to get away from it. But, it’s always there,” she explained.
The actress started dating Baena, a writer and director, in 2011, before fans learned that the couple had tied the knot in May 2021 when she referred to him as her “darling husband” in an Instagram post. Her rep later confirmed to PEOPLE that the couple had wed.
Following Baena’s death, Plaza and Baena’s family released a statement at the time and called his passing an “unimaginable tragedy.”
“We are deeply grateful to everyone who has offered support. Please respect our privacy during this time,” they said in the statement obtained by PEOPLE.
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If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline by dialing 988, text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741741 or go to 988lifeline.org.
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