Photo-Illustration: Vulture; Photos: @trishlikefish88 via TikTok, blndsundoll4mj via YouTube
You want Trisha Paytas’s advice on dressing up this Halloween. The podcaster, YouTuber, and all-around internet personality knows how to make a statement with her costumes. Who could forget the time she did a shot-for-shot remake of “Bet on It” from High School Musical 2, or her yearly tradition of recreating Steve Martin’s King Tut dance? Paytas uses cosplay to immerse herself in the world of her latest obsession, whatever it may be. “I always have such hyperfixations,” she says. “I just want to be in that movie. I want to be in that TV show. I want to be that person! So I make it happen.” After getting married and having two kids — Malibu, 2 and Elivs, five months — cosplay has become a family affair. This year, the whole squad dressed up as Frozen for Halloween, but she transformed into Elphaba in anticipation of Wicked’s release and did her best Penelope from Bridgerton for an appearance on her podcast, Just Trish.
Do you like Halloween? Some people who dress up for a living feel like it’s just another day.
I used to be that. I used to never do Halloween. I was like Amateurs! I do this all year round. For most of my 20s, I don’t think I had a Halloween costume. But I got into it in the past couple years with my kids. And obviously with the podcast and TikTok. I love doing cosplays on TikTok because you have sounds and stuff for it. So now I feel more pressure. I feel like I have to go extra hard. We’ve been building sets this year to elevate it.
Take me through your process a little bit, from ideation to whatever the final product is.
Sometimes it’s instantly. I saw Ariana Grande post at the Olympics in a pink satin dress on a Saturday. We had Hot Topics on Monday, and so instantly someone helped me with the dress and I was texting hair and makeup. I try to be as quick as possible if it’s something current. On things like Bridgerton, I’m so behind. But when something’s relevant and big, I try to have the quickest turnaround. Taylor Swift at the VMAs, I think, took me three days. The minute I see something and I’m like I want to do that, I pause the show and I take pictures from every angle.
How important is accuracy to you in a costume?
Accuracy is everything. We had a cosplay go wrong on our last podcast, and I didn’t have the outfit in time so I had to pick these generic Jurassic Park outfits from Party City and I felt very basic. I felt like every other person on Halloween. It has to be so accurate that you feel yourself. It drives me crazy if there’s a barrel curl instead of a finger wave for the hair. I’m not a perfectionist by any means, I feel like I’m a messy person, but that has to be perfect.
How important is hair to a Halloween costume?
Hair is the biggest giveaway. You can get away with being different genders, different races, even different body sizes. Obviously I’m a very different body type than most things. When you’re an exact copycat, it gets a little eerie and creepy.
For the people who just want to go trick or treating with their kids, get something generic. But if you really want to make a statement, you need to have the details, which is the hair. I also think you should bring something different than what other people would be. If you want to be Troye Sivan, then be Timothée Chalamet as Troye Sivan on SNL, something like that.
Do you have a running list of things you want to do? Do you keep a notes app?
My God, yeah. I have so many on my Notes app. I have it all listed down. Let me see what we have.
Yeah, give us a sneak peek.
I have my “Outfits to Get.” We have Debra Vance from Hacks, because I’m supposed to go on Delta Work’s podcast. I have the Beauty and the Beast trio. I have a Louis Vuitton Wicked jersey getting made like Ariana. I have Rosie O’Donnell from the 90s, Rosie O’Donnell from 2024, and a Victoria’s Secret Angel. But that one might not be so relevant anymore.
What is your costume library like at home? How much do you keep?
I actually sell most of it. I get something made, and it’s usually on Poshmark the next day. My mom sells my clothes on Poshmark full time, because I buy so much for cosplay that I could not store it all. I should store more, because there’s so many times I go I wish I had that piece from that costume. But I usually sell it on Poshmark within a day. It kind of pays for itself. Obviously if I have something made custom, I like to keep those. But in general, I just get it out of my house.
Is that true for wigs as well?
I’ve been investing in quality wigs this past year. I used to always just buy synthetic, cheap ones, which can come in handy sometimes.
Speaking of wigs and going on Delta Work’s podcast, how much do you see what you do as informed by or existing alongside drag?
I didn’t even know what a drag queen was until I was 18, but I feel like I was a drag queen my whole life. The first R-rated movie I ever saw was called Party Monster. I was 13 or something. There was a character named Angel who had these beautiful angel wigs. And I was like, I want to be that, I want to be them. I didn’t know they were real people. So that was my first influence into the club kid world.
In my day-to-day life I’m no makeup. I literally wear the same thing every day, couldn’t care less if things match. But my cosplay feels like drag performance, for sure. However, I will say I’m not even half as good as the drag queens on Drag Race. They do their own hair and makeup. Me? I outsource everything. I have a really good team that helps me with everything. I could never do it on my own.
Do you have any big Halloween costume Do’s or Don’ts you want to impart to our readers?
I would say do whatever you love. It’s really fun to just do whatever, even if no one knows who you are. My don’t falls into that too: Don’t be afraid. I cosplay Ariana Grande all the time, and we couldn’t have more different body types. I wouldn’t let that stop you, because it lets you live out this fantasy. And do invest in a good wig.
What about shoes? How much do the shoes matter for finishing off the look?
I’m kind of bad. I’m not really a great shoe queen. Since pregnancy, my feet are huge and they’re so wide. Every time I have a queen on my podcast, everyone’s always like “Trisha, why can’t you put on a heel?” But shoes, they are important and I will squeeze my foot into any shoe for the cosplay for a second. So if you’re gonna take a picture, the shoes are very important. My husband was Colin from Bridgeton. He’s squeezing his foot into this women’s size boot because that’s all we had. It’s very important for the picture. But if you go out, I would say you can do a sneaker version of it.
Have you ever accidentally stained your skin or had the wig stuck on too tight?
That just happened again this week with my Elphaba. I was green for the first time, and I was like This will be no problem to come off. I was scrubbing. I was dry exfoliating. I put oils all over my face, everything. It would not come off. I did a Playboy shoot yesterday, and all my skin was literally green. We had to counteract it.
Do you have a favorite of your cosplays? Or are they all your darlings?
My favorite that I’ve ever done was Zac Efron from High School Musical 2. I went to shoot at the same location up in Utah. I did a whole music video recreating it, because I love being Zac so much.
I really appreciated the styling on the bowl cut wig.
That was my first male wig because I never really didn’t male cosplays, and I love it. I actually love male cosplays more than females and I want to do more of them.
Would you consider binding for a costume, or do you think it’s more fun to be like a voluptuous person in those outfits?
I haven’t actually done it yet because I don’t think I’d do it properly. Ultimately, I want to get my implants out because I do think they’re making me sick. That would be my dream, because I really do think about how amazing cosplays could be if I could flatten my chest. I love boobs. For me, I think they’re outdated. They hurt my back, they make me sick. I could just wear a chest plate or something, but I love the idea of binding.
How did you decide to make King Tut annual?
That’s all the TikTok audience — the Gen Z kids. It was a year later and everyone’s like, “It’s coming up!” I was like, What are they talking about? All right, I guess I got to recreate this. I was pregnant the following year. This year, we did it with my two daughters. It’s wild in four years how different everything is.
That one went weirdly viral for a sound that was not viral at all when I found it. At the time, no one knew what it was or who it was. They just thought I made up this dance. This year I actually showed his footage to show that he’s actually doing the movements.
On a semi-related note, do you think that Martin Short and Meryl Streep are dating?
I think so. I love it. I love when older people find love. I love The Golden Bachelorette. And it makes sense; they’re both superstars.
I want to talk about the Challengers churro scene. Vulture predicted that there’s going to be a lot of Challengers throuples out there this year. What made you want to do that scene out of any of the scenes in that movie?
Challengers might be my favorite movie of the whole year. It has good sexual tension, good comedy. It’s awkward. It takes something as simple as eating a churro and makes it so artistic. Also just makes you want a churro. It’s a really easy costume, too. You get some Stanford stuff, some tennis racquets.
You did a Chappell Roan look, and Chappell’s a fan.
I love Chappell Roan. My God, it’s so crazy whenever she says my name.
How should people set themselves apart in a sea of Chappells?
God, that is a tough question. I think we all know, and I’ve done, the easy Chappell Roan ones. The Tiny Desk with the big hair. Finding a really, really niche Chappell Roan, like TikTok Chappell Roan, would be good. One where her hair is pulled back and you see the likes and the comments. You can never go wrong with being a meme of someone.
I usually try to go with not the popular costumes like Sabrina [Carpenter] and stuff like that, because how are you gonna compete? Just do something completely different. Like I would say, go as a Moo Deng, rather than Chappell Roan.
Moo Deng would be hard just because I don’t know how I would stay that shiny all day.
Have your husband spray you throughout the night.
My zookeeper misting me.
It’s actually a really good couples costume.
Any costume predictions of your own?
There’s that one with a lady and her chimp, everyone keeps wanting me to do her. And I don’t know what it’s from, but, I don’t know if I can do that.
From Chimp Crazy?
I haven’t seen it. It’s like some blonde woman who’s like “I love my chimp!” I don’t know the context of it, but I have a feeling there will be a lot of those too, because I keep getting tagged. Unless they just think I look like that woman. I don’t know. I haven’t seen her.
