Have You Seen Newton’s Latest Hollywood Starlet Yet?

By Charlie Breitrose

Newton native Jessica Chaffin shares the big screen with an Oscar winner and a comedy superstar in “The Heat.”

She plays Gina, the outspoken, outlandish and kind of trashy Boston woman dating one of the brothers of the main character Shannon Mullins, played by Melissa McCarthy (“Mike & Molly” and “Bridesmaids”).

McCarthy and Sandra Bullock (Academy Award winner from “The Blindside”) are an odd-couple law enforcement team in the movie now in theaters.

In The Heat, Chaffin worked with her comic partner Jamie Denbo, who hails from Swampscott. Denbo plays Gina’s best friends Beth.

You may recognize other members of the Mullins clan, most of who hail from Massachusetts – Bill Burr as Mark, Nathan Corddry as Michael, and New Kid Joey McIntyre as Peter. The movie was filmed in and around Boston.

The movie is just one of Chaffin’s projects, these days. She and Denbo have a podcast called “Ronna & Beverly,” in which they play 50-something Jewish women from Boston who dole out advice and interview real celebrities, according to a recent interview in Boston Magazine. She also works with the Upright Citizens Brigade in LA and is working on a pilot for CBS, according to the interview.