"A Sense of Humor Is Everything": Hannah Berner Talks Skincare, Comparison, and Comedy in the Social Media Age

Say hello to Unfiltered, a fresh beauty series where you'll get an exclusive glimpse into the dressed-down beauty routines of our favorite celebrities and content creators. They'll reveal their guilty-pleasure beauty practices, the five-minute-routine product lineup they can't live without, the one good-skin tip they'll be forever thankful for, and so much more. To bring every conversation full circle, we ask each celebrity to send us a selection of self-shot, filter-free photos of their choosing to capture the essence of their Unfiltered beauty philosophy.

Up next, we're getting to know comedian and podcast host Hannah Berner, who has partnered with Kiehl's on the launch of the new Ultra Facial Meltdown Recovery Medicated Cream. Below, she's answering all of our rapid-fire questions, sharing her go-to beauty products, shedding insight on her writing process, and more. Enjoy!

Let's start with some context. What is your skin type, and what are your skin concerns?

Not to brag, but I have combination skin, so I'm oily and dry, which apparently makes you age gracefully but also makes you super shiny. I'm glad that the glowy look is in because I've been glowy since day one. When my skin is dehydrated, I get more oil production, and it just isn't good. So hydration is my number one.

You've partnered with Kiehl's, and it's timed with the new Ultra Facial Meltdown Recovery Medicated Cream. I'm a huge fan of the original Ultra Facial Cream. It's actually the first non-drugstore skincare purchase I ever made when I was 15 with my babysitting money. What felt aligned about this partnership? Do you have any personal favorites from the brand?

I'm also obsessed with Kiehl's. I think it was the first brand that my husband and I would fight over because he's obsessed with unscented [products]. A lot of stuff I get is scented, or it feels super chemically, or it's sparkly or whatever, and he just wants an unscented moisturizer. I literally have to fight him off.

I want serums that I can trust. Their vitamin C serum. Their dark-spot serum. I love it. Also, because I travel a lot and I'm super dehydrated, I think their overnight mask is just amazing. It's not too thick. It's just enough to make you feel like you're not going to get clogged pores, but you're also going to wake up feeling refreshed. And then their lip balm! I'm dehydrated everywhere, so I love the lip balm.

I grew up in New York City, and I'd always see the Kiehl's store. It's not a chemical, mass-produced thing. It's honest and real. What I love about the Ultra Facial Meltdown Recovery Medicated Cream is that it's not too thick. I can wear it under makeup. I love putting it on as a primer for shows, and it helps [my makeup] last longer. I'm less greasy because of it, and the cooling is really great for me because I'm just always a little bit red.

Would you consider yourself more of a beauty maximalist or a minimalist?

I'm such a minimalist because I'm always on tour, and you can only pack so much when you're touring. I like to add vitamin C. Apparently, I should do some more hyaluronic acid. But yeah, hyaluronic acid, vitamin C, and moisturizer are the three things I'm focusing on right now.

People say double cleanse. Okay, whatever you want, but [I'm] just making sure I clean my face before I go to sleep. I find that if I don't shower at night, the oils from my hair affect my skin, so I shower every single night. That's where I get all my thinking done. When there's an emergency, I do love a mask. I love eye patches just because life is about the little things that make you happy.

Oh yeah, little luxuries. We love them. I'm obsessed with The Berner Line, the hotline for skin emergencies you set up with Kiehl's. Do you have any stories to share about your own skin emergency that has happened perhaps on tour or before you went onstage?

Great question. I once did not put enough sunscreen on. It was that first day of summer when your skin's not ready for a beach day, but you're like, "We're doing it," and you're there for like seven hours. Obviously, I didn't reapply, and I woke up the next morning with a sun blister on my lip. I don't know if you've ever had this happen to you. It's never happened to me before. The next day, I was supposed to fly to meet my boyfriend's family with a full blister—like huge. I couldn't hide it with concealer, so I'm walking around with it. People think it's herpes, but it was not herpes. It was pussing and bleeding, and I was just like, "Nice to meet you, parents!" That was my skin nightmare.

If it makes you feel better, last year, I was going to my sister-in-law's baby shower, and I got a full allergic reaction because I'm a beauty editor, and I'm constantly testing things. I think everyone in attendance was like, "Who is this?"

You're like, "Sorry that I'm sacrificing myself for people before they buy things."

Yeah, exactly. I'm a guinea pig. It just comes with the territory. Let's talk about your makeup routine. Are there any daily essentials that you rely on for your off-duty look?

Not to brag, but I, for some reason, have very pale natural lips. When I put a lip liner on, she's like a new woman, so I'm obsessed with lip liners and not necessarily expensive ones. I use Maybelline. I use Make Up For Ever. I'm liking brown shades right now—very '90s. And I like a lip oil over it. I'll do a Kosas lip oil or a Tower 28 lip gloss or a Fenty lip gloss. Then I love a little brow gel, like Rare Beauty's brow gel. If I'm feeling really frisky, I'll use a Charlotte Tilbury contour to just snatch me up a little bit, and I like the L'Oréal Telescopic Mascara.

I also love the L'Oréal Telescopic Mascara. For the Make Up For Ever lip pencil, do you use the shade Anywhere Caffeine?

Yes! And for Maybelline, I use the shade On It. It's amazing. It's really smooth, but yeah, everyone loves Anywhere Caffeine. Every makeup artist puts it on me. I'm obsessed with it also. I love It Cosmetics' CC cream.

Classic. So good.

Right? When you say you like something, I feel like I'm getting approval from a knowledgeable person. But that's really it. I don't need a highlighter because I'm already greasy. Throw on a little eye shadow, maybe. I do use a black Maybelline liquid eyeliner sometimes. I also want to throw in the Revision Skincare Youthfull Lip Replenisher. It's really, really good for hydration.

Ooh, okay. I have so many recommendations to work with. You make comedy and podcasting look so easy. Is it something that you always knew you wanted to do, or did you happen upon it?

Since I was little, I was always goofy and creative, and I loved playing pretend, acting, and getting attention. I happened to be athletic and born into a very sports-oriented family. At like 7 years old, I decided I wanted to be a professional tennis player. Comedy didn't cross my mind.

After college, I played for the University of Wisconsin, and I felt kind of burnt out. I felt like I had a creative side that I had been suppressing. I mean, I was always a little too goofy and chatty on the court. I was always showing a lot of emotions and joking more than I should, so slowly, I figured out that you could make money just joking with your friends. Once I realized that, I was like, "It's game time. This is what I want to do."

I think that my tennis career helped prepare me so much for the discipline that comes with things like traveling alone and performing onstage. It all came together, but I was a late-in-life dreamer of being a stand-up comedian.

I want to talk about your upcoming Netflix special. What is it like to work on such a big project? How do you begin to gather the material, edit it down, and get it into a certain time frame?

In a month, I'm going to film my second special for Hulu. After I shot my first special, I basically burned my material. It's not like being a singer, where you have a hit song and can sing it for the rest of your career. After a hit joke, people are like, "Funny, but where's the next one?" After the special, I had to start from zero, which is the weirdest feeling because you feel so accomplished, but then you also feel like you have nothing to work with.

I booked a bunch of comedy clubs. Throughout my life, whenever something makes me laugh or makes my friend laugh, I will take notes. I always say, "If it makes my best friend laugh, it'll work onstage." If Paige [DeSorbo] doesn't think it's funny, it's not going to work. So I have all these notes, and I would go onstage with a paper and try to make the audience laugh. It's called writing onstage, where you just tell a story and see if you can add more punches.

After about five or six weekends, I had a loose hour of new premises, and I was working on adding more punch lines. My comedy has to be relatable. For some reason, I'm not embarrassed to say something. That's my superpower. If I can make anyone feel less alone by talking about the stuff that I'm going through—whether it's silly or embarrassing or something I'm proud of—I will. I think that's why people can connect with my comedy.

Oh, 100%. And the girls love it. That can be a very brave thing to do. Do you ever get nervous, especially when writing onstage? I can't even imagine. I literally write the opposite of onstage. I'm at my desk by myself.

Stand-up comedians, we are writers, but we go about it in different ways. My hour is completely written out, but you don't know if it's funny unless you try it in front of people. I do have to say it is scary, but it just depends on your personality. I was scared to get a driver's license until I was 34, but I'm fine talking in front of 1000 people. I'm very scared of things I shouldn't be scared of and then not scared of things I should be.

When I played tennis, it was either you're a loser or you're a winner. With this, I find it's art, so it's less pressure in a way. I always say, "People don't remember what you said; they remember how you made them feel." I try to go out with the right energy and hope for the best, but I never walk off being like, "You're a loser," which I sometimes did with tennis.

That's the nice part about writing in any form. It's very much contextual. I assume you watch a lot of other comedians or find inspiration through them. I do the same with other writers. I read my colleagues' work and other books and articles. I think it can be easy to fall victim to comparison. I could be reading John Steinbeck, and I'll be like, "You could never write that!" Do you ever struggle with comparison?

That is such a good question, especially in the social media age because you are comparing yourself to the idea of someone. I think I realized that gratitude is important. The second you find yourself comparing yourself to someone's life that you made up in your head, it's important to think, "Wow, I'm so lucky to be where I am now compared to where I was." There's no competition when you're being authentic with yourself.

So yeah, John Steinbeck? Iconic, but he's not you. When I'm onstage, I don't try to be like anyone else. I don't try to contort my comedy to be like someone else who's successful. I stick with my voice. If I do feel a bit of jealousy, I try to use that. It's telling me what I want and what I want to do. I use it as motivation. "Oh, that's the direction I want to take my career." Let that inspire you.

I absolutely love that. In my case, I guess it's important to remember that I've never seen John Steinbeck write about skincare.

He'd probably be so bad about writing about skincare.

That's so funny. Using jealousy as a guide is a very cool concept. I love that. Okay, last but not least, what's your unfiltered beauty philosophy in seven words or less?

A sense of humor is everything. When you don't take yourself too seriously, it's so attractive. It's so beautiful. To be able to laugh at things makes everything lighter.

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