Who Is Ben DeSoto in American Horror Story Season 13? Joey Pollari’s Character Explained
American Horror Story: 13 may be bringing back an unusually large collection of familiar faces, but the new season is not being built entirely around nostalgia. While Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters, Emma Roberts and several other franchise veterans are revisiting characters from earlier installments, the person positioned at the center of the new…
American Horror Story: 13 may be bringing back an unusually large collection of familiar faces, but the new season is not being built entirely around nostalgia. While Jessica Lange, Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters, Emma Roberts and several other franchise veterans are revisiting characters from earlier installments, the person positioned at the center of the new story is someone viewers have never met before. His name is Ben DeSoto, and he is played by Joey Pollari.
That distinction is important. Ryan Murphy has described the 13th installment as more than a Coven reunion or a parade of returning characters. The old stories are being pulled together through a new narrative, and Ben appears to be the audience’s way into it. Official information released ahead of the premiere establishes him as a hospice worker whose new assignment brings him into Constance Langdon’s orbit and gradually connects him to the larger mystery surrounding Season 13.
Ben DeSoto Is a Hospice Worker
Ben DeSoto is a new character created specifically for American Horror Story: 13. Disney+’s official preview describes him as a hospice worker who is brought in and trained by Constance Langdon, Jessica Lange’s character from Murder House. Ben’s assignment is to care for a wealthy elderly patient whose past has not yet been fully disclosed.
That puts Ben in an unusual position from the beginning. He is not introduced as a witch, a supernatural figure or someone who already understands the history behind the people surrounding him. Instead, he seems to enter the story through what initially appears to be an ordinary professional responsibility.
The official description also makes clear that the more Ben discovers about his patient and the situation around him, the more complicated his life becomes. Exactly who the patient is, why Constance is involved in arranging the care and how the assignment connects to the returning AHS characters are among the details FX has intentionally kept secret before the premiere.
Constance Langdon Brings Ben Into the Story
Constance’s involvement is perhaps the biggest clue to Ben’s importance. Jessica Lange originated the character in the first season of American Horror Story, where Constance was closely tied to the history of the Murder House and the Langdon family.
Season 13 marks Lange’s return to the franchise after several years away, and Constance is one of multiple familiar roles she is revisiting. Rather than placing Constance in an isolated nostalgia storyline, the new season directly links her to Ben by making her the person who trains him for his hospice assignment.
That connection effectively places a completely new character beside one of the oldest characters in the AHS universe. It also gives the writers a natural way to introduce past mythology without requiring Ben to already know everything that longtime viewers know.
For viewers starting American Horror Story with Season 13, that appears to be part of the point. Disney+ specifically notes that audiences do not need to have watched all the previous episodes to follow Ben’s story, although familiarity with Murder House, Coven, Hotel and Cult will add more context to the returning characters.
Ben Is the Anchor of American Horror Story Season 13
Ryan Murphy has been unusually direct about Joey Pollari’s importance to the season. Speaking to Vogue, the American Horror Story co-creator explained that he did not want the new installment to simply become another Coven story despite the return of Cordelia Goode, Madison Montgomery, Myrtle Snow and other characters connected to that chapter.
Murphy said the returning characters needed a new story anchored by a new person, and identified Pollari as that person. That makes Ben more than another addition to an already enormous ensemble.
It also helps explain the structure of Season 13. The installment is bringing together characters whose original stories took place in different eras and circumstances. A new protagonist gives the show a neutral center through which those separate corners of the franchise can intersect.
Rather than asking viewers to choose one returning character as the main lead, the series can follow Ben as he encounters a world that becomes increasingly larger than the hospice job with which he started.
How Does Kira Connect to Ben?
Ben also has a personal connection to another Season 13 newcomer. Madelaine Petsch plays Kira, who has been identified in advance publicity as Ben’s girlfriend. Kira has an unusual fascination with the number 13, immediately linking her to the central motif of the season.
FX’s trailer places considerable emphasis on that number, while Disney+’s season preview says a present-day crisis brings characters from previous installments together as 13 repeatedly appears in troubling circumstances. Kira’s interest in the number therefore appears unlikely to be a random character detail.
How Ben and Kira’s relationship changes once the larger story begins has not been officially revealed. The promotional campaign has deliberately avoided explaining the complete opening storyline, making their connection one of the premiere’s unanswered questions.
Who Plays Ben DeSoto?
Ben is played by Joey Pollari, an actor who has worked across television, film and music since he was young. Born in Minnesota, Pollari appeared in Disney XD’s Skyrunners and Disney’s Avalon High before taking the lead role of Will McKenzie in MTV’s American adaptation of The Inbetweeners.
One of his most significant early dramatic roles came in the second season of ABC’s American Crime, where he played Eric Tanner. He later appeared as Lyle in the 2018 film Love, Simon and took recurring television roles in SEAL Team and Apple’s Sugar.
Pollari has also become increasingly connected to Ryan Murphy productions. He appeared as Anthony Perkins in Monster: The Ed Gein Story and had a role in FX’s The Beauty before joining American Horror Story: 13. More recently, his work has extended beyond acting into music, with Pollari releasing albums and directing music videos of his own.
Ben Is More Than a New Face in a Reunion Season
With so many established AHS characters returning, it would have been easy for a completely new character to disappear into the ensemble. Everything released before the premiere suggests the opposite is happening with Ben.
His hospice assignment gives Season 13 its new storyline, his connection to Constance ties that storyline directly to Murder House, and his relationship with Kira places the season’s recurring number 13 motif inside his personal life. Most importantly, Ryan Murphy has already identified Pollari as the figure around whom the crossover is constructed.
That means Ben DeSoto is not simply joining American Horror Story’s past. He appears to be the character responsible for carrying viewers from a new mystery into that past, giving Season 13 a fresh perspective even as some of the franchise’s most recognizable characters return.
