Maitreyi Ramakrishnan Admits She Lied About Her Ben-Paxton Choice & Blames Robert Pattinson
Never Have I Ever star Maitreyi Ramakrishnan trolled us all.
The cheeky 21-year-old Canadian actress admitted that she fooled everyone during her press tour for Season 4 of Never Have I Ever, telling some media outlets that she was Team Paxton and others that she Team Ben at the end of the show.
Ramakrishnan plays Devi Vishwakumar, a quirky teenager dealing with anger issues and the surmounting grief of her dad's death all while juggling high school and boys in the hit Netflix series.
Her main love interests are Ben Gross (Jaren Lewison), her academic arch-enemy who's constantly pushing her to do better and be better, and Paxton Hall-Yoshida (Darren Barnet), an older, bonified, popular heartthrob with a sensitive side.
Ramakrishnan infamously refused to pick a side in her character's love triangle and, over the first three seasons of the series, she's always claimed to be Team Devi.
Ahead of Season 4's release, Ramakrishnan announced that she would finally reveal which team she was on since it was the final season – but it looks like this may have been a premeditated trap.
"I hope interviewers ask me if I'm team ben or team paxton now since it's final season, and I said I'd reveal in the end sooo," reads her tweet.
In an interview with Narcity a few weeks ago, Ramakrishnan said she was Team Paxton.
"I am team Devi because I do support my girl. But I, of course, have opinions. I am a hopeless romantic. So I am Team Paxton," she said in the interview.
"I think their romances are the best. I think their scenes are just amazing. Like in how it's filmed, it's so just like gooey, you know, and it's just romantic."
Ramakrishnan continued and said that even though the pair aren't endgame in the series, there's always hope for the future.
"The door's not closed. The story continues. Never know what can happen. So there you go. Team Paxton, loud and clear."
While Ramakrishnan seemed to be Team Paxton, the actress told Entertainment Tonight that she was Team Ben and detailed how she loved their banter and that they're both a "hot mess," which makes them work well together.
Fans soon caught on that Ramakrishnan was trolling everyone and started commenting on videos of the Canadian actress switching teams.
"The fact that she's stating in different interviews to be team Ben or team Paxton is hilarious to me," commented a fan under Narcity's YouTube video.
"This girl be switching her answer every interview. I love the trolling, lol," wrote another fan.
In a sit down interview with Narcity to talk about her Tim Hortons Dream Cookies collaboration, Ramakrishnan confessed to pulling everybody's leg.
"Yeah, I lied to everyone [...] I genuinely can't remember who I told what. I just kept switching and I would make a passionate argument for each side."
Ramakrishnan said she decided to troll the press because she felt that people don't actually believe that she is just Team Devi.
"I mean, Devi is the centre of the show. I'm all about, you know, her and her journey as an individual. In interviews ever since the beginning, I've always talked about her self-love journey," she told Narcity.
"I think both Ben and Paxton are great characters. But I just think, like Devi, you can do better than the high school sweetheart, girl come on!"
Ramakrishnan said she did have fun seeing the fans react to her web of lies in real-time as interviews from the press tour came out.
"Team Paxton, I think, first woke up, and they were like, 'I always knew we could trust her. I knew we could trust Maitreyi. Maitreyi is Team Paxton. Wow, she's so real.' And then Team Ben was so betrayed, and then, like a day later, they were like, 'Wait a damn minute.'
"They were comparing, 'She said it in a video that she was Team Paxton, she only said that she's Team Ben in an article,' and then they pulled up a video of me saying I'm Team Ben, and chaos ensued."
Trolling everyone may have been the most Devi-like thing Ramakrishnan has ever done, but her antics were actually inspired by former teen heartthrob Robert Pattinson.
The Batman and Twilight actor is well known for making up wild lies about himself, from telling Jimmy Kimmel he was homeless in 2012 to telling the Chicago Tribune that he doesn't wash his hair and even saying that the first time he went to the circus a clown died in a car explosion while on the Today show.
In an interview with GQ, Pattinson said they he often lies in interviews just so he has something to say.
Given the fact the 37-year-old actor has been in the limelight for over two decades, he's had a lot of opportunities to lie about himself – and while most of the time his stories are borderline unbelievable, some did serve a purpose.
After Twilight, Pattinson reportedly continued auditioning in America and pretended to be from Michigan or Denver since he had been told his British accent could be an issue, according to Screen Rant.
Ramakrishnan is looking to follow Pattinson in his compulsive footsteps, so the next project you see her in, you may want to take whatever she says with a grain of salt.
"The next gig that I get, the next press tour, I'm going to make some lie that I don't shower like Robbie P. He lied about the fact that he doesn't shower. Obviously, he does."
Ramakrishnan hasn't announced what her next gig will be, but the Mississauga actress is currently studying human rights and equity studies at York University, so her professors and classmates may want to watch out for the time being.
Never Have I Ever Season 4 is out on Netflix, so if you want to make your own educated opinion on the Team Ben and Team Paxton debate, you can watch it there.
Although it's pretty clear that Ramakrishnan's final say on the topic is that she's Team Devi — and maybe a bit of Team Edward.
This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.
Energizer Bunny posted to Ramakrishnan's Instagram story.