Aubrey Plaza Describes Grief After Husband Jeff Banea’s D…

Aubrey Plaza is opening about her grief for her husband, Jeff Baena, sharing that it’s a “daily struggle” after his death earlier this year.

Plaza spoke with her former Parks and Recreation co-star, Amy Poehler, on the latter’s Good Hang podcast. Plaza promoted her new cop comedy with Margaret Qualley, Honey Don’t, out in theaters this week.

But before digging into her work—and reminiscing about their Parks and Rec days—Poehler gently asked the Ingrid Goes West actress about the “terrible, tragic” year that Plaza has endured.

“Right in this very very present moment I feel happy to be with you,” Plaza said around the 11-minute mark in the video above. “I feel … overall I’m here, and I’m functioning, and I feel, you know, I feel really grateful to be moving through the world. I think, like, I’m OK, but you know, it’s like a daily struggle.”

Plaza then said she had a “dumb analogy” for her grief, comparing it to horror flick The Gorge and its monster-filled abyss.

“That feels like what my grief is like, or what grief could be like,” she said. “At all times there’s like a giant ocean of, just, awfulness, that’s like right there and I can see it, and sometimes I just want to like dive into it, and just like be in it, and then sometimes I just like look at it, and then sometimes I just like try to get away from it, but it’s always there.”

Plaza and Baena, who worked together on Life After Beth and The Little Hours were married in 2021 after dating for 11 years. They had reportedly separated in the months leading up to the director’s death.

Baena was found dead in his Los Angeles home on Jan. 3, after which police said he died by suicide.

For more information about suicide prevention or to speak with someone confidentially, call or text with the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988, or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting TALK to 741741.