Trisha Paytas knows her Broadway. After just a few minutes on the phone, she’s already referenced a few shows that haven’t reached mainstream popularity (like Schmigadoon!), name-dropped some stage icons (like Sutton Foster), and said the words, “I’m going to get some honey and a vaporizer,” lamenting the toll rehearsals take on the voice. “Wow, people do this eight shows a week,” she says, with her iconic chipper giggle. “It’s wild.”
For major Paytas fans, this doesn’t come as a shock. The YouTube star and influencer has been noted for, in her illustrious, nearly two-deades-long career, parodying Broadway shows like Little Shop of Horrors, Hamilton, and more. She grew up in the chorus of her high school’s musicals and is a frequent Broadway attendee. Her first foray to 42nd street was to see The Producers in the St. James Theatre. Many years later, she is making her Broadway debut in the same space, starring in a one-night only, sold-out show called Trisha Paytas’ Big Broadway Dream. Paytas hits the stage, with several other Broadway stars, on Monday, February 3.
Paytas’s expedition to Broadway is confusing and abnormal. Her type, an influencer and internet star, isn’t frequently headlining a marquee or shimmying through a black box, unless it’s for an appearance in Chicago. She rose to prominence on YouTube, first launching her channel in 2007 and becoming a big hit around 2013. Paytas was knee-deep in peak YouTube, blowing up when VidCon tickets sold out within seconds.
At that time, Paytas was a different from the Zoellas, Colleen Ballingers, or StacyPlays of the world. While they did beauty tutorials, had a signature outlandish character, or posted Minecraft playthroughs, she became known for her candor, kookiness, trolling, and, yes, sometimes offensive takes. Paytas became synonymous with controversy. At one point, she said she identified as a chicken nugget, came out as transgender before taking it back (she now identifies as nonbinary), and dressed in a variety of costumes, sometimes accused of racism and cultural appropriation.
Perhaps that’s why she’s still around. While other big, golden-era names have faded, facing controversies and cancelations past YouTube’s prime, Paytas has managed to bounce back from her missteps along the way. She knows how to weather the public, has addressed her mental health publicly and head-on, and is now married with two children. Paytas has taken accountability for her past mistakes, comments, and actions, and she’s prepared to look inward again if needed. In a way, it’s a new era of Trisha. “I feel like I’m always going to just keep going forward, and that’s all I can do,” Paytas says. “I’m just happy to keep going.”
Paytas, now, is moving ahead at rapid speed. She has a bustling TikTok presence and a variety of other media ventures, like her own podcast Just Trish. She had a cameo in Katy Perry’s “Woman’s World” video and was also just recently invited by Bowen Yang to be on an episode of Saturday Night Live. The minute she took the SNL stage, Gay X (formerly known as Gay Twitter), went wild. “[Bowen’s] like, ‘I’m doing an SNL sketch if you want to be on it. It’s okay if you don’t.’ I was like, ‘This is the highlight of my whole life, what are you talking about?’” she recalls.
Perhaps she spoke too soon, as it seems another bucket list item gets its checkmark next week. In Trisha Paytas’ Big Broadway Dream, which benefits the Entertainment Community Fund, she’s joined by Broadway heavy-hitters Foster, Ben Platt, Rachel Zegler, and Joy Woods. It’s exactly what the titles says it is: A dream, one that sold out within minutes. “I’m just authentically myself for the first time ever in my career,” she says. “It just feels really nice to not have to try so hard and people still just being really receptive to it.”
Below, Paytas addresses her past and teases her upcoming Broadway debut.
How did Trisha Paytas’ Big Broadway Dream come together?
It was definitely Kobi [Kassal, Editor-in-Chief of Theatrely] writing an article on April Fool’s Day of last year, 2024. I Google myself, like, “What’s up in the news?” It was an article that said, “Trisha Paytas is going to star as Roxie [Hart in Chicago] on Broadway.” This was a dream role in my head. I was like, “Did this happen? Did I not know?” I got really excited and posted it. I didn’t know it was quite a joke either. I thought, “This is happening, let me share it.”
Kobi said it blew up for Theatrely It did really well. So, [Kassal and his producing partner George Strus] got in touch with my agents, and they’re like, “Well, if Broadway isn’t casting Trisha, let’s just put Trisha on Broadway.” They really did come up with the concept and I owe them so much. I got really lucky. Thank God for that April Fool’s joke. It turned into something so real.
What are you excited about for your Broadway debut?
The initial thing for me was getting to be on Broadway at the St. James Theatre. That’s where I got [to see] my first Broadway show. The second excitement was that now we have sold out. My fans really were like, “We don’t even know what the show’s about, but we’re going to support you.” That was so surreal. Then, we’re getting A-list Broadway, movie star actors to be in this with me. I was just like, “Wait, what is happening?”
Honestly, the high for me yesterday was meeting the ensemble and seeing how talented these singers and dancers were. They’re singing about me and my life story. It just really just made me emotional. All of it just feels like a dream.
What can you tease about the show?
It’s really about making your dreams come true. It’s a little biographical, it’s a little bit podcast style, it’s a little bit Christmas Carol, like interviewing Broadway legends, but also a little bit about meeting different legends of Broadway in different eras and giving me tips on how to make it here and on the stage and in New York.
What does it mean for you to be sharing the stage with Ben Platt, Sutton Foster, Joy Woods, and Rachel Zegler?
All four of them have truly had an impact on my life in so many ways. I was just happy with truly anybody, but each of these people were people that I’ve been obsessed with. I met Ben last year at Saturday Night Live. I saw him, but never thought it was a possibility, Rachel as well, as she’s currently in Romeo + Juliet. We only communicated on DMs. Joy Woods was unexpected too, because she’s currently on Broadway in Gypsy.
The biggest surprise to me was Sutton Foster. My jaw dropped because I’ve just loved her for so long. Sutton is the first theater girl that every theater girl wants to be. I saw her in Young Frankenstein and Shrek. I was just like, “There’s no way.”
If I could pick a dream cast, this would be it. There was no other. They all were long shots.
What roles on Broadway are you dying to play?
I would love to be Joseph in the Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Audrey in Little Shop of Horrors. Roxie in Chicago. But, I’d be Dr. Dillamond [in Wicked] at this point. I would just like to be anyone on Broadway. I see Brigadoon is coming, I think Legally Blonde is coming to the Kennedy Center. All of that, it’s all my dream role.
It is cool now to have my own show, because I’ve always been in the background. I get to be the star for once in my life, so it’s really a one-night-only, once in a lifetime opportunity.
How did you react when Katy Perry asked you to be in her “Woman’s World” video?
How did that happen? I don’t know. I had just given birth two weeks ago when Katy Perry’s people reached out. it was an email to my Hotmail account, which is very personal. No one knows that account. It said ‘A-list celebrity wants you in music video.’ So it sounded like a scam. I reply to everything myself, so I was like, “Okay, let me see.” They called me. They were like, “It’s for Katy Perry next week.” And I was like, “Sure, why not?”
I didn’t know much about it. I met Charlie Chops [a.k.a. Charlotte Rutherford], this amazing director, and I just worked with her again. I was so excited because Katy Perry obviously is an icon of my generation. I just say yes to everything,
I think I’m really happy and stable in life, and the universe is just like, “Okay, I think you’re ready now for everything you wanted.” I’m able to handle what I always wanted. I don’t think in the past, mentally, I could handle all of this, and now I’m just thriving and loving it. It’s a lot of the fans just really hyping me up and giving me a resurgence on TikTok.
What would you say to people who believe that you shouldn’t have a platform and that you should remain canceled, who maybe would say, ‘Why is ELLE even interviewing Trisha Paytas right now?’
I take the cancellations as accountability. I think, in general, people want people to grow and get better and change. I just lacked self-awareness for a while, and now I’m fully, fully aware of stuff. I had to have 1,000 people tell me like, “Wait, this is wrong, this is not right,” for me to fully get it. I appreciate the internet being like, “Oh, that’s a bad take or whatever,” because that’s only when you can change. I’m so fortunate for second, third, fourth chances. I think that’s how we’ll get better as a society.
Why is mental health so important to you?
I didn’t know I had a mental illness until I was 32, so I thought most of my life was just, “Well, this is just how I am. I’m just a mess and that’s how you have to take me.” I got a lot of help and I went to therapy, but it wasn’t until I needed something to change for. So first, I met my husband. People were judging him for being with me. So, I was trying to change a little bit.
But then, my daughter [Malibu Barbie] was born. I was really like, “Okay, I need to take this seriously. I need to get a grip on what’s wrong with me.” I have a chemical imbalance, and for her, I just was like, “I need to get this fixed, and I need to make it right. I need to try my hardest.” I’ve been putting in a lot of work to control my emotions. Now, it comes second-nature to me.
With TikTok and this new generation of people finding me, it’s like I gave birth to thousands of babies. I’m just like, “I want to be better for them. I want to show that I’m not going to relapse and ways to get better. You can get a grip on your emotions, and you can get a grip on your mental health. It’s not totally out of reach.”
For me, it was my daughter, but now it’s this whole new generation. I really do want to seek out this bright path, because it feels so good for me. I also just want to show people that it’s not just, “Oh, Trisha’s crazy. Wait until she snaps. Wait until she does this.”
It’s been years now, and it’s been great for my own mental health. There’s hope. Get help. You don’t need to have a husband and kids to change for, but you definitely need to find something inside of you that you want to change, and be better for yourself or your family or whoever.
In the coming year, you have the Eras of Trish tour and more of your Just Trish podcast.
The tour’s the big one. The Broadway show’s been the most preparation that I’ve ever done for a show, and it’s been so fun already. Going on a tour after will feel like an after-party. Everyone will get to see [my Broadway show] because it’s live-streamed, so I think it will be a celebration of everyone that gets to see it and continues in its own little way. That goes until the summer. I’m excited because it’s already been such a crazy year starting off with this. I don’t know where it goes from there.
It feels like you manifested this Broadway moment. How does it feel to have these dreams realized?
Where there’s a will, there’s a way. I just think passion goes a long way. It’s wonderful to watch people who are perfect and just so skilled and obviously amazing to watch, it’s what inspires me, but I think in this day and age, people like to see people just like themselves doing things. It shows that anyone can. I’m very, very normal. I’m very regular. There’s nothing special about me other than I see myself on stage and doing what I love. I think that’s a big key, just seeing where you want to be in life, no matter what it is.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.