<\/p>\n
I\u2019m at my desk in Las Vegas waiting for Perez Hilton to enter the Zoom, and I\u2019m thinking about the last time I threw up from drinking. It was Sept. 9, 2023, at the Palms Casino Resort. Technically, I threw up after I left the Palms, after I lost my phone and then found it again, after I sent one text that said \u201clovvve you\u201d and another that said \u201cp b at hmm,\u201d <\/em>after I got in the pool with my clothes on, after I insisted my friends drive me to a strip club, after I announced when we were almost there that actually I was going to be sick and needed to go home. And as I threw up and cried for the first time since living in a dorm, it occurred to me how fitting it was that I\u2019d just been at a party co-hosted by one of the central figures from my millennial college years: Perez Hilton.<\/p>\n From what I remember of the event, a benefit supporting Aid for AIDS of Nevada, I was in a booth at a nightclub and Hilton was onstage. He wore a red suit, like a character in a movie playing a stylish version of the devil. The crowd cheered as if he was as famous as he\u2019d been in the early aughts, and I wondered if I\u2019d time-traveled back there. I was, after all, at the same hotel that had hosted the 2002 season of MTV\u2019s The Real World <\/em>where Trishelle, Steven, and Brynn hooked up in a hot tub in the first episode, and I was about to go to a VIP afterparty at early-2000s nightlife destination Ghostbar. But no, I was not in a time warp; I was just in Vegas, where I live, and where Perez Hilton does, too. He\u2019d become a Vegas local earlier that year, making the move with his three children and his mother after 20 years in Los Angeles. He cited the warm reception he received in 2018 during a two-month guest-hosting gig for Chippendales as a motivating factor. In a YouTube video filmed shortly after his move<\/a>, Hilton spoke from the kind of sand-colored living room that is ubiquitous in Las Vegas tract homes. He talked about familiar Vegas topics\u2014adjusting to the Southern Nevada Water Authority\u2019s irrigation restrictions, the appointment-based DMV system\u2014and praised the \u201csense of community here that Los Angeles doesn\u2019t have.\u201d<\/p>\n I\u2019ve never heard anyone say that about our transient city, but I can see why he felt that way. His arrival was met with a fawning article from the Las Vegas Review-Journal<\/a>, a video of the showgirl cast of VEGAS! THE SHOW<\/em> welcoming him to town<\/a>, the cover of local LGBTQ+ magazine QVegas<\/a>, and a flood of followers to his new Instagram account, @lasvegasperez, where he documented meals at local restaurants and weighed in on a feud between two Las Vegas influencers<\/a>.<\/p>\n Before he was a local Las Vegas celebrity\u2014a curious group that includes Carrot Top, Pauly Shore, Floyd Mayweather, and, for the last years of his life, O.J. Simpson\u2014Hilton was one of the most powerful people in celebrity media. Born in Miami to Cuban immigrants, Mario Armando Lavandeira Jr. created his Perez Hilton identity shortly after moving to Los Angeles. In his memoir TMI: My Life in Scandal<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>which is one of four books he\u2019s written (there are two other nonfiction books and a children\u2019s book), he explains how he chose the name: \u201cThe \u2018Perez\u2019 in me was the outsider, the Latino guy, the homosexual, the person who stuck out, and the \u2018Hilton\u2019 referred to Hollywood, the mainstream.\u201d<\/p>\n His eponymous website, which launched in 2004, was originally called \u201cPageSixSixSix\u201d until the celebrity.land\u2014home of Page Six\u2014filed a lawsuit<\/a>. PerezHilton.com quickly became synonymous with the cruel style of celebrity gossip that dominated the pop-culture landscape in those days. This was the era when a stolen recording of an inebriated 19-year-old Paris Hilton having sex with her 31-year-old boyfriend became a bestselling adult video<\/a>. This was the era when you couldn\u2019t go to the grocery store without a magazine cover demanding that you look at the 72 best and worst beach bodies<\/a>.<\/p>\n Hilton was relentless during these years. He scrutinized famous women\u2019s bodies, attempted to out closeted men, mocked child stars with drug addictions, and drew crude doodles on paparazzi photos. If you are a millennial, you already know this, but if you didn\u2019t or you blocked it out, here\u2019s a non-exhaustive list of some of the worst things Hilton posted in the early aughts: a topless image of Jennifer Aniston<\/a> (who he called \u201cManiston<\/a>\u201c), an upskirt photo of a then-underage Miley Cyrus<\/a>, an upskirt photo of a then-underage Taylor Momsen<\/a> showing her tampon string, a link to Colin Farrell\u2019s sex tape,<\/a> a photo of Vanessa Hudgens that he\u2019d drawn ejaculate on<\/a> accompanied by mocking coverage of her leaked nude photos, numerous<\/a> photos<\/a> of Lindsay Lohan with crude drawings and jokes about her addiction struggles, photos of Mariah Carey with the nickname \u201cMooriah<\/a>,\u201d a photo of Elizabeth Hurley\u2019s wedding with the headline \u201cEven Whores Wear White<\/a>,\u201d <\/em>countless attacks on Britney Spears calling her things like \u201ca trailer trash ghetto princess<\/a>\u201d and an \u201cunfit mother<\/a>,\u201d bullying of not-yet-publicly-gay men like Lance Bass<\/a>, Matt Bomer<\/a>, and other male celebrities \u2026 and somehow also a false report that Fidel Castro was dead<\/a>.<\/p>\n When I talk to millennial women about 2004 to 2010 PerezHilton.com, everyone seems to have a specific photo, doodle, or nickname that they remember. For me, it\u2019s a 2008 post<\/a> about Mischa Barton, who was on a downswing from her time as teen royalty following her controversial exit from The O.C.<\/em><\/a> and a drunk-driving arrest<\/a>. Hilton wrote: \u201cSomehow, Mushy Fartone got an invite to the Costume Institute Gala at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC on Monday night. She must have gone as someone\u2019s +1! Thankfully, the former TV actress kept her cottage cheese thighs covered.\u201d<\/p>\n That same year, a man I was dating had used those same words\u2014cottage cheese thighs\u2014<\/em>to describe my body. We were in the car having an argument that had nothing to do with my appearance and he spit it out so suddenly, so angrily, that I could tell he\u2019d been thinking it for a long time. I should have dumped him or at least demanded an apology, but instead I just sat there in silence, staring at the blur of darkening forest from the highway. I realized then that I was not alone in the disgust I felt when I looked at myself.<\/p>\n I\u2019d spent most of high school on a low-carb diet, becoming so thin I lost my period, so obsessive I had a breakdown after consuming a single Reese\u2019s cup. I bought diet pills that gave me heart palpitations and read magazines that suggested that the worst thing you can do when you\u2019re hungry is eat. I watched a reality show where women got plastic surgery and then competed in a beauty pageant. In college, I became editor in chief of our university magazine and a photo of our editorial team sparked an anonymous debate about whether or not I was hot. On weekends, my friends and I lined up at frat parties awaiting the judgment of the men who got to decide if we were attractive enough to enter. If one of us didn\u2019t make the cut, we abandoned her and went inside, down to the basement where on the ceiling in large letters it read \u201cbring your daughter to the slaughter.\u201d <\/em>We read what Perez Hilton wrote about Britney Spears and learned to hate her, but not as much as we hated ourselves.<\/p>\n If you\u2019re a millennial woman, you already know some version of this. It was the world that raised you too. Now, I was going to come face to face with someone who could possibly be held accountable for at least some of it. He wasn\u2019t the architect, but he did help lead the construction.<\/p>\n I wanted to talk to Perez Hilton about his apologies. His latest had come after a life-threatening incident in April, which led to yet another reinvention here in Vegas\u2014this time one straight from God.<\/p>\n Hilton\u2019s modern apology tour began with the one he made in 2009 after he called Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas a homophobic slur<\/a> during an altercation. (GLAAD was displeased.) Then, there was the 2010 YouTube video \u201cI\u2019m Going to Be Doing Things Differently<\/a>\u201d and the apology on The Ellen DeGeneres Show<\/em><\/a> following accusations of hypocrisy when he was contributing to the It Gets Better campaign<\/a>, which was created to support LGBTQ+ youth. In nearly every interview I could find from the years that followed, he was asked about these apologies and forced\u2014or perhaps given a platform, depending on how you look at it\u2014to repeat them.<\/p>\n More than a decade later, there was this, his most recent apology, from April 2026, which didn\u2019t seem connected to any controversy, but functioned as a sort of blanket statement of regret and remorse. In a video titled \u201cI\u2019m Sorry! AND\u2026<\/a>,\u201d Hilton spoke from his bed. He wore a T-shirt with a close-up of Britney Spears\u2019 face, her mascaraed eyes looking up at him. He held a Bible. Through tears, he talked about a newfound faith in God and, referencing his past, said, \u201cI\u2019m sorry. I will continue to apologize.\u201d<\/p>\n Even though he\u2019s softened his tone over the years, Hilton has kept up a frenetic pace of posting about celebrities. His namesake website is still very active; a recent headline<\/a> alleges that \u201cJennifer Lopez DID Have A Fling With Brett Goldstein While Filming Office Romance!\u201d He hosts a weekly pop-culture podcast, The Perez Hilton Podcast<\/em>, with radio personality Chris Booker. He posts daily videos on YouTube and maintains multiple social media accounts. He is also on Cameo, where he creates personalized videos within 24 hours of purchase starting at $44 for personal use and $500 for businesses. In one recent Cameo<\/a>, he congratulates someone named Patrick on launching an app, with the caveat, \u201cI\u2019m not going to mention the name of your app because if you want a business Cameo, that\u2019s a separate booking.\u201d<\/p>\n I\u2019d been following his three Instagram accounts\u2014one personal, one for the website, and one for Las Vegas content\u2014and found myself surprisingly endeared to his enthusiastic posts about our shared city. We were both fans of Majestic Repertory Theatre, a small immersive theater company in the Arts District. We liked the same restaurants\u2014not just on the Strip but in neighborhoods, and I was hoping we could have lunch at one of them.<\/p>\n I emailed his sister, Barbara, who has worked with him since he launched his website. She said he wasn\u2019t currently doing in-person interviews\u2014he\u2019d just gotten out of the hospital\u2014but we could set something up virtually. In a YouTube video from March 23<\/a>, \u201cMy Stupidity Got Me In The Hospital For 21 Days! This Is The Most Important Video I\u2019ve Ever Shared,\u201d he explained he\u2019d developed an ulcer which led to sepsis. What followed was a nearly monthlong hospital stay. He couldn\u2019t walk, eat, or control his bodily functions. Through the experience, he said in the video, he\u2019d found God. Like me, he\u2019d grown up Catholic, but he hadn\u2019t believed until nearly dying. The Instagram version of the video got reactions from television psychic Tyler Henry and right-wing pop singer Joy Villa, but also comments from people I knew in Las Vegas. It felt, in some way, like the universe wanted us to come face-to-face, wanted me to hear him out.<\/p>\n Still, I was skeptical of Hilton. I had a feeling that, like the previous apologies, which seemed to coincide with a shift in the media away from open cruelty, the \u201cI\u2019m Sorry! AND\u2026\u201d video that followed was an attempt to adapt, to latch onto a trend or new audience. Maybe it had something to do with the recent spike in conversions to Catholicism<\/a>. I suspected that this was also why he\u2019d moved to Las Vegas in 2023; it has been ranked as one of the best cities for a fresh start<\/a>. It\u2019s a place that\u2019s open to reinvention. And those of us who live here know how people on the outside see Las Vegas: a drunken mistake, so artificial it\u2019s impossible to imagine real people calling it home. As a result, sometimes it seems to me like the city is desperate to be taken seriously. Even when Perez Hilton is the one validating us, we\u2019ll take it.<\/p>\n Las Vegas is also a strange mirror of Los Angeles. I thought about that often when writing my debut novel, Close Relationships with Strangers, <\/em>which is about a Las Vegas wildlife photographer who moves to Los Angeles and becomes a paparazzi photographer. The narrator is frustrated with Las Vegas\u2019s reputation and limitations; he sees Los Angeles as a land of possibility. And if L.A. is where you go to pursue your dreams, Vegas is where you go to retire or rebrand. I did the latter when I moved here. I\u2019d been working in the national parks and I wanted to live in a city and be a writer. For other people, Las Vegas is where you go when you\u2019ve been priced out of or exiled from California. Our celebrities typically fall into at least one of those categories. Music artists who no longer have the energy to tour find residencies. Actors who are too red for blue California find a fanbase in purple Nevada. Could this be where the man who started the most hated website in Hollywood finds forgiveness? A flood of believers commenting on his latest apology seemed to think so, leaving messages about grace and prayer. A REAL Christian won\u2019t be against Perez, <\/em>one person wrote, and I felt my Catholic guilt kick in.<\/p>\n A week before the interview, I had breakfast with a friend at a diner. I ordered eggs and fresh fruit. I kept an eye on the time so I wouldn\u2019t be late to Pilates. Sixteen years after Perez Hilton\u2019s \u201cI\u2019m Going to Be Doing Things Differently\u201d video, and on the brink of my novel being published\u200d\u2014a huge dream, coming true\u2014I\u2019m still trying to be smaller and prettier. I have mostly accepted that I will always be trying. Of course, I don\u2019t blame Perez Hilton for that, but I do think his website, which had as many as 14 million views in a single day<\/a> at its peak, had some influence. And I know that a lot of women feel the same way. I\u2019m planning on asking him what he might say to them. I also plan to bring up the Barton \u201ccottage cheese thighs\u201d post, to tell him about the effect his words had on me. It seems so embarrassing, though, to ask for an apology from someone who didn\u2019t even know I existed when he was hurting my feelings.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t want to be mean,\u201d I told my friend\u2014somewhat ridiculously, given who I was about to talk to.<\/p>\n The name in the Zoom waiting room is Mario. When I click admit, <\/em>his face materializes and the name changes to Perez. He\u2019s wearing a silver crucifix necklace. I tell him I hope he\u2019s feeling better. \u201cSix weeks ago, I was broken totally,\u201d he says. He\u2019s closer to normal now, and he has this focused, intense energy. He has straight teeth and a big smile. He raises his eyebrows often, widens his eyes, and talks with his hands. His first dream was to be an actor\u2014he once had two lines on an episode of The Sopranos<\/em>\u2014and I can see how he comes alive when there\u2019s an audience, even if today that audience is just me. He asks me if he should get a ring light or change the angle of his camera, but I assure him I\u2019m not going to be posting a video recording anywhere.<\/p>\n When I ask him about his relationship with Las Vegas, he cuts me off, but not in a rude way\u2014it\u2019s more like he\u2019s so excited to talk about it that he can\u2019t help but start.<\/p>\n \u201cFor the longest time, the Mob ruled Vegas, and that Mafia mentality is still in place in many ways,\u201d he says. \u201cIt took me a while to learn that the powers that be here do not appreciate honesty. They just want you to be a cheerleader, and if you\u2019re not, you\u2019ll be blacklisted so quickly. And Vegas is such a small town. In Los Angeles, I didn\u2019t care about access to celebrities, but here I care about access to this new restaurant, that new experience, whatever it might be. So I had to adapt. It\u2019s very rare that I\u2019ll have a negative experience somewhere, and if I do, I just won\u2019t talk about it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI had to adapt.\u201d <\/em>I ask, \u201cDo you think Vegas treats celebrities differently than L.A. does?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOh, absolutely. If you\u2019re in L.A., you\u2019ll only get comped if you\u2019re the top tier in whatever you do,\u201d he says. \u201cBut in Vegas, if you\u2019re a C-list actor, or even a D-list actor, or a C-list creator, or a D-list creator, you\u2019ll still get the royal treatment.\u201d I don\u2019t ask him what category he\u2019d put himself in, and I also don\u2019t volunteer which one I think it is. In the early aughts, he was a household name. Now when you Google him, one of the first related searches is \u201cWhat happened to Perez Hilton?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThey really roll out the red carpet for anybody with any following,\u201d he says. I think of a pool party I went to hosted by a cast member of a short-lived reality show. \u201cI get stopped a lot in Vegas, but not so much in L.A. And people here are always so nice.\u201d<\/p>\n I mention the \u201cI\u2019m Sorry! AND\u2026\u201d video he posted after getting out of the hospital in which he said, \u201cI\u2019m not used to being supported. I\u2019m used to getting hate.\u201d I\u2019d seen so many clips of him in the past where people regarded him with suspicion or disdain, and in every one he just took it. In a 2009 episode of Keeping Up With the Kardashians<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>Hilton approached a booth where several members of the family were sitting at a party and a wide-eyed Kris Jenner looked up at him and said, \u201cI don\u2019t know whether to hug you or kill you.\u201d He hung around long after that, appearing unfazed.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cIt kind of seems like you\u2019re surprised by kindness,\u201d I say.<\/p>\n \u201cI feel like I have impostor syndrome. Like, why are people being kind? I think everybody deserves kindness, but not everybody gives kindness.\u201d<\/p>\n This seems like a good time to ask him about his own pivot to being nicer. I tell him about a paparazzi photographer I spent time with while doing research for my novel who told me about the golden age of his industry, which was also when PerezHilton.com was at its height. That was over now, the photographer said, because the public no longer had an appetite for cruelty. \u201cI disagree totally,\u201d Hilton says, and cites what most people cite when explaining the downfall of the paparazzi industry\u2014less print media and more social media. His own empire, which was born on the internet, is still monetized through online ads, though he also has a Patreon now<\/a>. \u201cI don\u2019t think the masses even care or spent much time contemplating the ethics of paparazzi.\u201d<\/p>\n I look at his crucifix necklace, the silhouette of Jesus at the center like a missing piece. I know he found it while spring cleaning because I saw him talking about it on Instagram<\/a>. \u201cThe more you are in tune with God, the more he speaks to you,\u201d he said to the internet. \u201cIt was no coincidence that I found this.\u201d<\/p>\n Weeks after our conversation, his video \u201cChristians vs Catholics – what the differences are<\/a>\u201d will start a debate in the comments. The subject matter will be different, but the people will be just as opinionated as the ones who respond to celebrity news items on PerezHilton.com. He\u2019ll start selling T-shirts and mugs with religious figures on them<\/a>. \u201cWear something holy, praise Him, and support your boy if you want,\u201d he\u2019ll say in an Instagram reel<\/a>. He will explain that he is selling Jesus mugs because he is in \u201chustle mode\u201d to pay off his hospital bills\u2014a deeply American combination of words.<\/p>\n But we spoke before the religion merch push, so I am genuinely curious when I ask him if his newfound faith has influenced what he does. He stops to choose his words, as he often does during our conversation. \u201cYou know, people recently have asked, \u2018Now that you have found God, are you going to stop doing what you do? God doesn\u2019t like gossip.\u2019 And I respond, \u2018Well, I don\u2019t do gossip. I do celebrity journalism.\u2019 \u201d (Hilton uses this term pointedly\u2014when Blake Lively\u2019s lawyers accused him of participating in a smear campaign against her, calling her things like \u201cBlake Lies-ly,\u201d the American Civil Liberties Union of Nevada defended his free-speech rights as a journalist and later gave him a Civil Rights Leadership Award.)<\/p>\n \u201cNot everybody believes in letting people evolve and grow, and I think it\u2019s a cautionary tale,\u201d Hilton tells me. \u201cThat\u2019s why I\u2019m happy to keep apologizing.\u201d A few seconds later, he adds, \u201cBut I\u2019m also done with my apology tour. I\u2019ll still apologize, but it felt like for many years it was just nonstop apology tour, and that was appropriate. It should have been that. But recently\u2014and some people might roll their eyes\u2014but you know, I had this really powerful and real experience in the hospital with God. And I know that God forgives me. And just as importantly, I forgive myself.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOK,\u201d I say, shifting in my seat and looking at my own face on the screen.<\/p>\n I am part of the \u201csome people might roll their eyes.\u201d I am smiling nervously when I say, \u201cOn that note, I want to ask you about something specific. So, in 2008, um \u2026\u201d I stop myself and say, with the tone of an apology, \u201cI was looking back on like, very old posts from the website, and thinking about things that, like, I saw when I was young.\u201d Later I will rewatch the Zoom and wince at how often I say like <\/em>when I\u2019m uncomfortable.<\/p>\n \u201cOne thing that always stuck in my memory was the way you talked about Mischa Barton. There was this post where you were talking about her cottage cheese thighs at the Met Gala, and I\u2019m curious, like, especially now that we\u2019re kind of in this era of\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n Hilton interrupts me. \u201cIn 2008, I was still very unhealthy\u2014I don\u2019t like to use the word fat<\/em>\u2014not that that\u2019s a bad word. Actually, let\u2019s use it for this conversation. I am still a fat person, even if I\u2019m not fat right now. A fat person has a fat person\u2019s mentality and way of thinking, and isn\u2019t that always the case that a fat person is going to be jealous and project and throw darts at somebody else? And this is not deflecting. What I said and did was wrong, but with the posts on women, more often than not the negative comments about women are from women, or, you know, Us Weekly. And all of these tabloids, they were run by women.\u201d<\/p>\n I feel my face go hot. Surely, he\u2019s not implying that women are the real misogynists?<\/p>\n \u201cWhat would you say to women who feel that your language really hurt them and influenced how they feel about their bodies?\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI would say I understand why many people aren\u2019t open to forgiving me, and that\u2019s OK. Everybody, I believe, can be better and do better, and that\u2019s all that I\u2019m doing now.\u201d<\/p>\n He smiles. I can tell he probably knew that I was working up to that question the whole time. He seems to always know what other people are not saying. He has a habit of vocalizing the words of imagined haters. When we\u2019re talking about his faith, he mimics the voice of someone who doesn\u2019t believe him: \u201cPerez\u2019s latest grift.\u201d Nearly every time he does this, he says exactly what I\u2019m thinking.<\/p>\n Later, I watched more of Hilton\u2019s YouTube videos, social media stories, and interviews, and I heard the same words from our conversation, sometimes almost verbatim. He is good at giving sound bites, constructing his sentences so that each can stand on its own. For example, when I mentioned TMZ\u2019s new Washington coverage and asked if he\u2019d be doing more political content as well, he said no, and compared what he does to McDonald\u2019s: \u201cNobody wants to get a salad at McDonald\u2019s.\u201d But, interestingly, he actually has<\/em> been more overtly political since our interview. His celebrity news stories are interspersed with rumors about Tulsi Gabbard\u2019s resignation<\/a> from the Trump administration and updates on ex-Prince Andrew\u2019s ties to Jeffrey Epstein<\/a>. He appeared on right-wing political commentator Tomi Lahren\u2019s show<\/a> and praised Republican and former reality-show villain Spencer Pratt\u2019s Los Angeles mayoral campaign.<\/p>\n It all comes back to what he said when he started selling religious merch to pay down his medical debt: He is in hustle mode. He has been his whole life. In his memoir, <\/em>he writes that he was riding his bicycle around L.A. when he couldn\u2019t afford a car, illegally subletting his apartment in New York, reselling books that were sent to a magazine he worked at, starting his website with the free Wi-Fi outside of a Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, making friends with celebrities but never getting too drunk around them because sloppiness interferes with the work. He has always had a natural instinct for what\u2019s about to be popular. He heard \u201cJust Dance\u201d by Lady Gaga before it was released to the public and shared it to his website because he knew she was going to be a star. He launched PerezHilton.com a year before TMZ was created. I am sure that the switch to kindness, the move to Las Vegas, and the sudden faith in God are more examples of him being first to identify a trend, which is not the same thing as an actual cultural shift. Yet deep down, I want to believe him when he says that people can evolve\u200d\u2014because I want to believe that about myself.<\/p>\n I keep thinking about the moment his name switched from Mario to Perez on my screen. I know it was just a function of the software\u2014an account name versus a display name\u2014but it also pointed to something more unsettling.<\/p>\n One of the last things we talked about was the difference between Mario and Perez. Mario, the outsider who was bullied as a child, who was banned from the Chateau Marmont as an adult. Perez, the insider, who has appeared in a Rihanna music video and on a stage with Oprah.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen I go to a red carpet,\u201d he told me. \u201cI\u2019m showing up as Perez. I\u2019m not showing up as Mario.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHave you thought about what it would look like if you did show up as Mario?\u201d I asked.<\/p>\n He laughed. \u201cOh, God. I mean, if I showed up as myself, I\u2019d probably wear just, like, all black. I\u2019d be more worried about looking good.\u201d<\/p>\n