Paris Hilton, a pop culture icon well known for her trademark “baby” style of speaking, has opened up on how she created the contrived speaking voice as “a trauma response.”
Hilton first said in 2020 that the voice fans had heard her use since she hit the spotlight in the early 2000s was not her actual speaking tone.
Now, in a new interview with fellow singer Bebe Rexha for Nylon magazine, Hilton discussed what it was like to shed the “playful” persona that helped create the well-known voice, as she opted to use her natural voice while recording her new album, Infinite Icon.
“I wanted to create this perfect Barbie doll life because of what I went through as a teenager at those emotional-growth boarding … I hate even calling them ‘schools.’ This was a protective mask,” she told Rexha, referring to the time she spent as a teenager in corrective behavioral institutions, where she has said she experienced serious abuse.
“And then getting on The Simple Life, I was being told, ‘We want you to play up this ditzy airhead character,'” she continued. Newsweek contacted Hilton’s representatives by email for comment.
Paris Hilton at the House Committee on Ways and Means hearing on “Strengthening Child Welfare and Protecting America’s Children” in Washington, D.C., on June 26. The singer recently discussed what her real voice sounds like.
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Hilton and fellow socialite Nicole Richie starred in the reality TV series The Simple Life, which followed the two heiress as they lived with regular people and took on menial jobs, completely removed from their normally glamorous lives.
“I didn’t realize it would be such a huge success and we’d have to continue on for five seasons. Doing all the late night shows and interviews, of course I would have to use the voice there, too. So I just got used to it,” Hilton said.
The singer also didn’t use her real voice on her 2006 debut album, the self-titled Paris, which featured the hit single “Stars Are Blind.” However, the Australian writer and singer Sia, whom she worked with on Infinite Icon, encouraged her to use her real voice when singing.
“I mostly would use my breathy Marilyn voice,” Hilton told Rexha of her singing style when making the 2006 album. “But Sia really pushed me to sing with my real voice, like how I talk in real life.”
While she has started to use her real voice more often in public, Hilton said the playful voice would never be fully retired.
She said: “I’ve been on this whole path of self-discovery the past few years, with my documentary, my memoir, and now with this album. I’m reclaiming my story. That voice is the more playful side of me. I’ll do it if I’m shy, or if I’m just having fun. It’s part of my personality, so I think it’s going to be part of me forever.”
Infinite Icon is out now.
