Lucy Hale Says a Crew Member’s Comment About Her Face During the First Season of Pretty Little Liars Still Haunts Her Today

Lucy Hale says a passing comment from a crew member during her early days on “Pretty Little Liars” still shapes how she sees herself more than a decade later.

Lucy Hale and Ashley Newbrough on stage together at the CW’s Television Critics Association Press Tour panel in Beverly Hills, July 2008. Photo by Kevin Winter / Getty Images.

The actress was in her early 20s and shooting the show’s first season when a crew member who worked on the lighting pointed out something about her face. Hale won’t say exactly what it was, only that she’d never noticed it before — and that she’s fixated on it ever since.

Lucy Hale alongside Pretty Little Liars co-stars Troian Bellisario, Ashley Benson, and Shay Mitchell at a Disney and ABC summer press event in Burbank, CA in May 2010. Photo by Frederick M. Brown / Getty Images.

“I had never noticed that about my face before, and to this day I still hyper focus on that,” she said, describing how a single offhand remark can rewire the way a person sees themselves.

Lucy Hale steps out for the “F*** Marry Kill” screening in Santa Monica on March 6, 2025. Photo by Jon Kopaloff / Getty Images.

Hale was 21 when the ABC Family series premiered in 2010, launching her into the role of Aria Montgomery, which she would play across seven seasons. She has since called that stretch the moment her insecurities “really flared up,” arriving just as she was still working out who she was as a young woman while standing in front of the camera every day.

“It was really confronting being in front of the camera while I was still trying to figure out who I was,” she said. “But at the same time I was living my dream, so it was a good payoff for me.”

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