Shailene Woodley At first I didn’t realize that his mother The Secret Life of the American Teenager was actually an 80s teen icon.

The actress revealed this during a recent appearance on Vanity Fair“Scene Selection” from that she had no idea who Molly Ringwald That’s when they began working together on the ABC Family drama, which ran from 2008 to 2013. Ringwald played Anne Juergens, the mother of Woodley’s Amy Juergens, on the series .

“I didn’t know who Molly Ringwald was,” Woodley confessed. “I was 15 and I didn’t grow up with a TV. For example, all of my parents’ friends were like, “You work with Molly Ringwald!” And I was like, “What is she… Why?” I don’t understand. Because I had never seen Breakfast Club Or Sixteen candles or any of his films.

However, the Three women The actress said she didn’t watch any of the films by director John Hughes that catapulted Ringwald to stardom when he was a teenager.

“I got to know her as this beautiful older sister mother figure to me, who was really protective of honoring, like, my authenticity as a young person and who I was and just being, like, a kid playing a kid . “Woodley explained. “She protected me in that way and I’m very grateful to her because there’s pressure for people to grow up very quickly, especially when it comes to Hollywood.”

THE Divergent the star added that she “learned a lot” while working on The secret at a young age, including storytelling and “the types of messages that I want to convey to the world or maybe not convey to the world.”

While Ringwald was already known in the past The Secret Life of the American Teenager premiered, it was Woodley’s first starring role in a television show.