Aubrey Plaza speaks publicly about grief after Jeff Baena's death

Aubrey Plaza has spoken publicly for the first time about the grief she has carried since the death of her husband, Jeff Baena, in January, describing it as a daily struggle while emphasizing that she is moving through life with gratitude and support. In a candid conversation on a widely watched podcast, she said she is “here and functioning” and that some days she feels stronger than others, underscoring the ongoing emotional weight of the loss.

Baena, a writer and director, died at his home in Los Angeles early this year. The couple had been together for more than a decade before marrying in 2021, on their tenth anniversary, in a small, improvised ceremony. They had separated in September 2024, according to public reporting surrounding the events, a detail Plaza acknowledged as part of the personal context that has shaped the past year. The death was ruled a suicide, and Plaza has since been seen navigating the aftermath while continuing to work on her own projects, including a Heidi Fleiss biopic.

During the discussion, Plaza used a stark cinematic metaphor to articulate the enclosure of grief. She described grief as an ever-present “giant ocean of awfulness,” with a gorge...