Trisha Kay Paytas born May 8, 1988 is an American media personality, YouTuber, model, and singer. Born in Riverside, California, Paytas was raised in Illinois before relocating to Los Angeles in their teens. After moving, they became a stripper and began acting on the side, primarily as an extra. They went on to appear in a number of music videos for artists including Eminem, Amy Winehouse and The All-American Rejects. In 2006, Paytas created blndsundoll4mj, a lifestyle-oriented YouTube vlog channel, and in 2014, they created a companion’ channel, TrishasLife, later Trisha Paytas, which featured more personal vlog videos. Following the success of several viral videos, Paytas garnered a significant following on their main channel. As of May 2020, they have accumulated roughly 4.88 million subscribers and roughly 1.7 billion lifetime views. Recently, Paytas has also become popular on the social media app TikTok.
Alongside their online presence, Paytas was a regular on the television shows The Greg Behrendt Show (2006–2007) and Who Wants to Be a Superhero? (2007). In 2017, they appeared on the 20th series of the British reality television show Celebrity Big Brother. Since 2014, Paytas has worked independently as a recording artist, releasing one cover album, 9 extended plays and 35 singles. In 2019, they embarked on their own headlining tour, The Heartbreak Tour, to promote their music. They have also hosted their own podcast shows, including The Dish with Trish (2015–2016; 2019–2020), Let’s Talk About Sex (2017–present), and Frenemies (2020–present) with Ethan Klein of h3h3Productions.
Paytas’s other endeavors include authoring several self-published books, modeling for lingerie and fetish photoshoots, guest appearances in various films and television shows, and her own perfume, eponymously titled Trish.
Early life
Paytas was born in Riverside, California, to Frank and Lenna (née Kant). Paytas was raised outside Rockford, Illinois in the city of Freeport. At 15, Paytas relocated to California to live with their father and brother, and enrolled in a Catholic online school program. She returned to Illinois to live with their mother at age 16, attending high school in Pecatonica.
Career
2006–2012: Beginnings on YouTube
After moving to Los Angeles to pursue acting, Paytas began doing professional lingerie modeling and worked as a stripper and an escort to support herself. They attempted to break the world’s fastest-talker record on Guinness World Records Unleashed, but was unable to break the record. In 2006, Paytas made their first television appearance as a correspondent to Greg Behrendt on The Greg Behrendt Show. They appeared on the show for its full thirteen–episode run before it was cancelled after only airing one season. The following year in 2007 they appeared on the second season of Who Wants to Be a Superhero?. Paytas played “Ms. Limelight”. They were on the show for four episodes although they were eliminated from the competition portion of the show on the third episode. On January 3, 2007, Paytas started their YouTube channel “blndsundoll4mj”. The channel was originally dedicated to movie director Quentin Tarantino, whom Trisha idolized, but soon after being created, Paytas began to focus on other types of videos. Blndsundoll4mj primarily gives fashion, beauty and relationship advice videos.
From 2008 through 2010, Paytas appeared on television shows including The Price Is Right (2008), The Ellen DeGeneres Show (2011), Jane by Design (2011), Huge (2011), and Modern Family (2011), among others. They portrayed Jessica Simpson in the 2009 Eminem video “We Made You”. They also appeared as a background dancer for rapper M.I.A. at the Scream Awards in 2010. Later in 2010, they appeared in the videos for “Playing the Part” by Jamey Johnson, “A Girl’s Got to Do What a Girl’s Got to Do” by Barbwire, and “Tears Dry on Their Own” by Amy Winehouse. Paytas made an appearance in a Guns N’ Roses’ tour video, playing a mobster’s girlfriend. Paytas starred in the Les Savy Fav video for their song “Sleepless in Silverlake” and portrayed Marilyn Monroe. In 2012, they played a stripper in The All-American Rejects’ music video for “Beekeeper’s Daughter”. Paytas appeared in 2010 on an episode of My Strange Addiction as a self-admitted tanning addict. Despite being aware of the high chances of developing skin cancer.
2013–2017: Online success and music releases
During this time, Paytas made a number of “trolling” videos, which she told Business Insider were a way to “dumb myself down” in order to get more attention and views. This involved videos claiming that dogs do not have brains, or that she was voting for the 2012 Republican candidate for President of the United States, Mitt Romney.
In June 2014, Paytas created a companion’ channel, “TrishasLife”, later Trisha Paytas, which featured personal vlog videos. In turn, she began posting her more stylized or music-related videos on her main channel, blndsundoll4mJ. She also began posting mukbang sessions and eating-challenge videos. As of July 2017, she has over one billion lifetime views for her more than 2,500 uploads.
The video for her song “Fat Chicks” was featured on websites such as Cosmopolitan, The Huffington Post, and Business Insider. Van Halen member David Lee Roth provided the introduction to the accompanying music video for Paytas’ cover of “Hot for Teacher”.
She released the EP Superficial Bitch on June 29, 2015. Its music video was released on July 23. A second music video from the EP titled “Leonardo DiCaprio” was released on August 7. The following year, in June 2016, Paytas released her fourth EP, Daddy Issues. It was her first EP to appear on the Billboard charts, debuting at number 25 on the Heatseekers Albums chart.
She later became a housemate on Celebrity Big Brother 20 but left the show on August 11, 2017, after only 11 days.
2018–present: Concert tour and podcasts
In February 2019, Paytas released a cover of “Shallow” by Lady Gaga and Bradley Cooper where she sang both parts. In four days, the video garnered over a million views.
In October 2019, Paytas revived her podcast, The Dish with Trish. Originally on SoundCloud as an audio-only, one-take show, Paytas revamped the show with a full set and a video set up on the PodcastOne network. In August 2020, she announced the podcast was cancelled.
Since September 2020, she has been a co-host of the YouTube podcast Frenemies with fellow YouTuber Ethan Klein of h3h3Productions.
Personal life
Paytas has had several public long-term relationships. Paytas dated American dancer Sean van der Wilt from 2014 to 2016 and American YouTuber Jason Nash from 2017 to 2019. Since 2020, they have been dating Israeli artist Moses Hacmon, and the pair got engaged in December 2020. Paytas has identified with different religious beliefs throughout her life, mainly Roman Catholicism.
Paytas has mentioned that they have suffered from unspecified mental illness; they have exhibited traits of borderline personality disorder in their videos. In an interview with H3 Podcast, Paytas admitted they used to have substance abuse problems and was once hospitalized after a methamphetamine overdose. They said their main issues were from ages 19 until 22, followed by five years of sobriety, and several minor relapses. Paytas has stated that their main addiction was to prescription pills.