In ELLE.com’s series Office Hours, we ask people in powerful positions to take us through their first jobs, worst jobs, and everything in between. This month, we spoke with pop culture enthusiasts Hunter Harris and Peyton Dix, co-hosts of the new Wondery podcast Lemme Say This. Harris and Dix have been friends since they first met in a film studies course at Emerson College, where their “original beef,” Dix says, was over whether or not their teacher should be considered hot. Soon after, Harris convinced Dix to write a fashion column, Dix Pix, for their school newspaper, and their work partnership was cemented. Both went on to write for major publications, and now, they’re freelance creatives as well as friends. In May, Harris hosted a live event for her beloved Substack newsletter, Hung Up, and the same day, she and Dix released the first episode of Lemme Say This, appropriately titled, “Are You A Lover Girl or A Hater B*tch?” With new episodes rolling out each Wednesday, Lemme Say This is more than a window into their friendship; it’s a (hilarious) guide to the messy, wondrous world of modern pop culture. Below, the two self-proclaimed “internet carnivores” detail how they went from unpaid internships to fully paid conversations about Nicole Kidman and Love Island.
How we launched our careers
Dix: Both Hunter and I worked in editorial in our first internships—many unpaid, by the way. And we’re not nepo babies, okay? We’ve earned this shit. Lots of editorial internships got me into working full-time at Paper Magazine as a social editor. I worked at The Outline before that, but I found my true voice in doing social-digital storytelling. I became the head of social at Paper, moved from there to InStyle, where I was the special projects editor. And then I went brand-side to MAC Cosmetics, where I was a global social director. It was a great job; I just really wanted to be freelance. I left and did a lot of consulting brand-side, social influencer strategy, all of that. The podcast conversation is one that didn’t start this year. It’s something that’s been in our brains for a while, but it wasn’t the right time.
Harris: We both moved here the same summer, 2016, and when I moved to New York, it was for a job at Refinery29 as an editorial assistant for the entertainment desk. I did that for six months, and then I started at Vulture as an associate editor. Then I got promoted to staff writer, and after a couple years of doing that, I left New York Magazine to start the newsletter, Hung Up, in November 2020. And I’ve been running the newsletter ever since. We started talking about [the podcast] last winter, and we finally have it out in the world.
The jobs we’d never do again
HH: Let me tell you, I nannied for these [girls]. It was the summer before I went to college, and it was hands down the worst job of my life. I was so bad at it. This is what kind of nanny I was: I just sat around reading all day, and the mom was like, “You’re not playing [Dance Dance Revolution] with them enough.” I was like, “I’m actually modeling good behavior. I’m modeling how to be a reader. Sorry.”
Dix: Nannying is something I would do in a heartbeat all over. If I didn’t love money so much, I would definitely be a dog walker and a nanny again. It was actually the sexiest I’ve ever been, but the poorest I’ve ever been. But [the job I’d never do again is] probably working retail. I worked at Urban Outfitters in college. Everyone would come in piss-drunk and steal, and they would look at me, like, “Stop them.” I’m this 5’4”, 130-pound girl. You expect me to tackle that 200-pound man who’s wasted? A Boston man?
The best advice for building a platform
Harris: Find a niche that someone knows to come to you for. I would think if [fan account] Club Chalamet is tweeting 10 times a day about Kylie Jenner and Timothée Chalamet, people would think, “Oh, what does Hunter have to say about this?” [It’s about] building some kind of rapport with your community, and having things that they expect from you. Then, consistency. We’re getting to that point with the podcast where people are already like, “Oh, it’s Wednesday. I know that I’m going to hear two bitches yapping today.”
Dix: Some of the best advice I got earlier in my career was that in three scrolls [on your social media], [audiences] should understand what you care about. Not to say that you can’t care about multiple things, but those things should be clear. If it’s me, it’s Twilight/queer fandom, social strategy, and media. Maybe being gay is separate from Twilight. That’s kind of its own thing. [Laughs.]
Something that’s important is: A tweet is a Reel is a TikTok. It’s the best advice I’ve ever given to my clients, because it allows you to be lazy in the cross-pollination of an idea. If the idea I had on Twitter did well, screenshot a version of that, put that on Instagram. Let me walk and talk and sip a coffee [and talk about the tweet], and now that’s another form of media. It feels kind of shitty, at moments, to do a song and dance performance of, “Here’s my life!” But when you’re allowing yourself to understand that you’re playing to an algorithm, and there is a purpose, then it’s something that can be used to your advantage, if you treat it like a business.
Our strategy for an effective social post
Dix: A photo so fab it doesn’t really need a caption, and a caption so funny, I almost forgot about the photo.
Harris: I think every post should have one funny tweet or meme or TikTok or something that’s shareable. Because if I get through three of your photos, and I see something so funny that I have to share it to my own Story, that feels like the easiest way to engagement-bait, honestly.
What we wear to feel powerful
Dix: Any Ganni, to be honest. Ganni makes me feel like I have a sickening 401k match. But, in general, I live most of my life in a button-up. Throw on a blazer, uh-oh, she’s corporate.
Harris: I keep wanting to do a thing on the podcast where we dress as each other, because I’m always about to put on a button-up, and then it never comes together. I think I’m my best in an exercise skirt. More flirty. I’ve got places to be. It looks like I’m in a rush. But, actually, I love wearing some kind of dress pants with a belt and a white tee and a sweater over my shoulders. I do that all the time.
The proudest moment of our careers
Dix: In 2020, during COVID and the Black Lives Matter protests, I was at InStyle. I reached out to a bunch of either big-name people I was in cahoots with or PR people to help book [Instagram Live interviews and fundraisers]. One that I did with Rachel Cargle raised $10,000. That was really crazy: to be holding the space and getting such attention on people that are doing important work, but also being able to put money where my mouth was. [That’s] the kind of work I feel good about, creating conversation and giving back to communities that look like me.
And then, opposite side of the spectrum: At InStyle, I’d been trying to do a shoot with Megan Fox for forever. We shot her in bisexual lighting. We had, I kid you not, zero dollars, but we did this phenomenal video with her. I created and directed the entire shoot. I called her personally to convince her to do it. It was something where I was like, “I need this to happen. This is my child. This is my baby.”
Harris: Mine, honestly, sounds so stupid in comparison. I think the first was going to Italy and writing the Succession cover story [for New York Magazine] on two weeks notice. It’s crazy to be following a bunch of people around a Tuscan villa, but to do all that and not speak any Italian? I still think about it all the time.
The other thing is putting together the [Hung Up and Substack] event that happened. I wanted to have something that felt like a natural extension of the newsletter. I chose the most special, genius friends to be a part of it, and they made it happen and made it feel like I actually learned so much. And having people drink cocktails called the Tree Paine Power Publicist Paloma? That’s everything I’ve ever wanted.
Our work mantras
Dix: [Holds up a picture of herself as a baby.] I have a little note above my desk that says, “When you’re being mean to yourself, you’re being mean to her,” with this photo. I’m often a critic and a bitch to myself, so I feel like I have to remind myself, “Oh, there’s a little girl that’s always learning and exploring and trying her best, and, like, be fucking nice to her.”
Harris: The other thing is that no one is thinking about you. No one is as hyper-fixated and obsessed with the smallest details of every piece of my work as I am, and that feels sort of freeing. The number of people who notice [a mistake]—versus the number of people who literally don’t care and who don’t see it as some damning condemnation of my entire life—is zero. All of that exists only in my own head.
On whether we feel like we’ve “made it”
Harris: Yes and no. There are things I’ve always wanted to do that I haven’t done yet. At the same time, I had to let go of impressing my 18-year-old self. I made a lot of goals for myself at 18. I wanted to be on staff at The New York Times by the time I was 30. How did that go? Not great. If I had told myself at 18, or when I was in college, that I would quit my dream job—it was my dream, working at New York Magazine—[young Hunter] wouldn’t be able to understand what can be, unburdened by what has been.
As much as I want to write and direct my own feature film, and sell a memoir about my crazy affair with, I don’t know, Robert Pattinson—at the same time, my goals for myself are changing all the time, and I think that’s a good thing.
Dix: I feel the same. A few years ago, I was being courted to be the editor-in-chief of Teen Vogue, and I was thinking, This was everything I’d ever dreamt of. [But] I feel like so many of my goals were never mine, actually. Or they were a dated version of who I thought I should be. My life changed after quitting my job to go freelance, because it allowed my brain to open up to things I didn’t know I’d want to try...what really feeds my whole soul, not just my bank account. Don’t get me wrong. That’s great, too. And it’s lovely when both of those things can exist in the form of, let’s say, a podcast.
Harris: One more thing: As young women—as Black women, especially—I wanted to do really big things, but I couldn’t see a path for myself. And in a lot of ways, giving up a more traditional structure and saying, “Actually, I’m going to quit my job and start a newsletter, and then three years later, I’ll have a podcast with my best friend,” I could never have even imagined.
It feels like you’re giving up something by having a job that you can’t explain to your parents, in some weird, regressive way. At the same time, so many things I get to do every single day are by my choice. This life would not have been possible if we hadn’t taken the big step of quitting our jobs. It’s about taking a chance on yourself. It’s about believing there’s more I have to give than what’s being asked of me in this 9-to-5. Now we’re getting really eat, pray, love.
This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.
