When Paige DeSorbo was applying to colleges, her mom suggested broadcast journalism school. “You would be a great news anchor,” she said. DeSorbo agreed; she always loved reading off a teleprompter and ended up attending journalism school in upstate New York. Today, the Bravo reality TV star, 32, isn’t exactly reading off a teleprompter, but she is constantly addressing the public.
DeSorbo and her best friend and former Summer House castmate Hannah Berner parlayed their weekly Instagram Live musings into a podcast, Giggly Squad, in 2020. There, they bring comedic takes to everything from tariffs (chamoy pickles should have an extra tariff, they decided recently) to the appropriate level of closeness between adult men and their mothers.
With more than 44 million downloads as of last year, DeSorbo and Berner have gone on tour, appeared on The Tonight Show, and are now translating their charming and satirical advice into book form, with How to Giggle: A Guide to Taking Life Less Seriously, out today.
DeSorbo spoke with Fast Company about the strategy that’s propelled her career so far:
Choose a business partner like you pick a spouse
I met Hannah my first weekend on Summer House, and we immediately hit it off. Not to jinx it, but we don’t see what we do as work because it’s just talking to each other. Of course, we have to make [business] decisions, but we don’t have a scheduled time during the week for that.
We’re talking constantly and bring up work things the way we would any topic. We also have a shared Google Doc and Notes app. When things come up that you’d normally text your friend about, we write it down and wait until the podcast. We call ourselves low-maintenance friends. We’re low-maintenance business partners, as well.
Hannah and I have never gotten into a fight about anything business-related because we think of things the same way. There’s so many other areas where Hannah and I are completely opposite, but we feel like Giggly Squad is our baby, and we’re co-parenting. It’s like getting married. It’s the biggest decision of your life, and you have to choose wisely.
Know when to sacrifice hair and makeup
When we were about to start the Giggly Squad podcast, Hannah and I had to literally go open a Giggly Squad bank account. Doing that with her, I felt like I was 13 years old, but we were represented at agencies. We had to make sure Giggly Squad felt authentic, like the Instagram Lives we’d been making before, even though we were making it more professional.
That’s why we love our tour so much. On Instagram Live, you’re in the comments. With podcasts, you never get to interact with listeners. Our live shows are almost like we’re back in our Instagram Live days, but in person.
When we first started touring, Hannah and I wanted to get our hair and makeup done [for every show]. This is the most non-Paige-coded thing ever, but Hannah suggested we do our own hair and makeup so we could nap during the day. I was like, that’s the best idea. I need to nap before the show. I’ll sacrifice hair and makeup. Now, we’ve gotten so good at doing it ourselves.
Use your own voice
When Simon & Schuster came to us to write a book, any Bravo person I talked to said you get a ghostwriter. But both Simon & Schuster and Hannah said it needed to be in our voices, because it’s comedy.
We wrote the book fifty-fifty. Some of the stories are the same, but one version is from Hannah’s view and the other’s mine. It starts with how Hannah and I met. I love seeing her perspective. Then we have different personalized stories from our childhoods that have to do with our moms and growing up. We were influenced by magazines from when we were younger, full of quizzes, graphs, and charts. We wanted that element in our book because it’s fun and nostalgic for us.
Now, I can’t imagine our book being written by a ghostwriter. Giggly Squad is so nuanced—we have so many inside jokes. Explaining that to someone would take too much time.
Be fully present
At this point in my life, in my early thirties, I’ve got passion for my career. It is my number-one focus. Not to say that I don’t want to get married and have children—I absolutely do. But it’s slowly [becoming] okay for women to say, “I’m going to wait on that part because I want to give it my all.”
When I’m doing something, I want to be fully present. With Giggly Squad, writing a book, and going on tour, I want to be fully present. The same goes for motherhood and being a wife.
Don’t believe the haters . . . or your fans
Before I was on Summer House, I watched a lot of Bravo. When you’re watching it, you see people do things and think, ‘That is so crazy! How do you not remember you’re being filmed?’ Then when you film a reality TV show, you forget there’s cameras there, and you become so close with production. When they’re in the room, you forget they’re producers.
A producer told me, before my first season even aired—he was preparing me for it being on TV—50% of people will like you and 50% will not. You can’t believe either [group]. You can’t believe your hype, but you also can’t believe the meanest thing anyone’s ever said about you. That was really good advice because when I started, I didn’t have that many followers on Instagram and didn’t think about that aspect. That helped me with all the social media reactions and opinions.
Trusting your gut is the biggest part—and not just with your career, but in your entire life. There have been so many times in my career where people have questioned Giggly Squad or what I was doing on Summer House—anything. Knowing yourself and believing in your decisions and power is the most important career advice.