{"id":46027,"date":"2015-02-27T12:37:33","date_gmt":"2015-02-27T11:37:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wonderlandmagazine.com\/?p=46027"},"modified":"2015-02-27T12:39:40","modified_gmt":"2015-02-27T11:39:40","slug":"sun-city-girl-ashley-benson","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wonderlandmagazine.com\/2015\/02\/27\/sun-city-girl-ashley-benson\/","title":{"rendered":"Sun City Girl: Ashley Benson"},"content":{"rendered":"
Pretty Little Liar turned Spring Breaker, there\u2019s a lot more to anti-fame icon Ashley Benson than meets the eye.<\/p>\n
Red chiffon shirt and yellow, red and black wool mix skirt all by MIU MIU<\/em><\/p>\n There are some TV shows you can just pop in on, and pick up on the action\u00a0and characters and plot from that point forward. Pretty Little Liars<\/i> is not one of them. The ABC Family teen thriller is exasperatingly conflated, full of red herrings, redder herrings, and herrings of a red so bright it would make a Ferrari blush. Something about a girl being killed and someone named \u201cA\u201d (possibly the dead girl) haunting her friends via text message.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m so confused about the show myself,\u201d says Ashley Benson. She plays Hanna Marin, who is either the mean girl or the funny girl or the vulnerable girl. On a cold late-December day, sipping an iced tea at the restaurant within the Chateau Marmont, that citadel of celebrity, she laughs at the thought of hardly knowing what\u2019s going on in the show that\u2019s made her something of a hero among teens.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone\u2019s like, \u2018What\u2019s happening?\u2019 I\u2019m like, \u2018I honestly don\u2019t know,\u2019\u201d she says with another hearty, raspy laugh. Unlike the show\u2019s liars, it is quickly apparent that Benson is brutally candid. \u201cWe film so much, I never remember anything. I\u2019ll be filming a scene, and I\u2019ll be like, \u2018Wait, why are we doing this, what\u2019s happening, and who is this person?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n But there are obviously a lot of people out there who do know exactly<\/i> what\u2019s going on, because it\u2019s the cable network\u2019s longest-running show ever, having just confirmed a seventh and supposedly final season. \u201cI think they want to do more, and a film,\u201d Benson says. \u201cIt never stops getting bigger. I\u2019m like, \u2018The fact that you guys still like it after five seasons of not knowing who the hell \u2018A\u2019 is, I applaud you.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Because of her role as Marin, Benson is extraordinarily popular \u2013 5.3 million fans follow her on Instagram, the tabloids tirelessly debate her love life, and she attracts attention, wherever she goes, from the show\u2019s zealous fans, many of whom have grown up with Benson throughout the show\u2019s five seasons and are now going off to college. But there\u2019s a sense that Benson isn\u2019t exactly comfortable with the pressure of fame.<\/p>\n