“Do you do the ABCs when you go down on females?” is not most people’s variation of an icebreaker, but Hannah Berner thinks it must be. Berner, 32, has turn into one of TikTok’s preferred comedians, famed for her “Han on the Street” video clips in which she asks fellow comedians questions about sexual intercourse, dating, and the opposite gender.

“There are no boundaries,” Berner states of the online video notion. “When I inquire them a bizarre question, they come again with a little something weirder.” For example, the ABCs concern acquired responses like: “I assume everyone ideally is asking her what alphabet she desires, irrespective of whether it is Cyrillic or Mandarin” and “I realized if you hold your head nonetheless, their overall body will shift to where they want it to be.”

To Berner, TMI doesn’t exist. From her 3-season stint on Bravo’s Summer Household to her two podcasts, Berning in Hell and Giggly Squad, she’s introduced the exact same unfiltered energy. Her national comedy tour and TikTok existence are just a continuation of that. Whether she’s inquiring about someone’s grooming routines or their ability to orgasm, Berner doesn’t mind inquiring probing issues. It is essentially anything she thinks most people must be accomplishing much more of, specially on dates. “F*ck regular relationship concerns and listening to about their hobbies,” she says. “Ask them: ‘Do you consider in blue balls?’ ‘Do you care about entire body count?’ From their answers, I can convey to so significantly, like regardless of whether they’re all set to day or have to have to do the job by means of some demons.”

Down below, Berner tells Elite Everyday about her comedy and her TikTok — additionally, why she thinks men and women must have a perception of humor about relationship and sexual intercourse.

Elite Day by day: Your comedy movies have fairly significantly taken in excess of TikTok, and you are on tour correct now for your stand-up. Was there one particular unique minute when you knew you wanted to changeover to pursuing comedy whole-time?

Hannah Berner: It definitely arrived from a definitely dark time. I was 25 and providing T-shirts for a company. The 9-to-5 was making me really depressed, and I panicked. I recognized that could not be the relaxation of my existence and that I’d have to make a improve.

I realized I required to be on digital camera. For a whole lot of gals, it can be seemed down upon to want to be witnessed and get up room. But I realized if I didn’t do that, I was likely to be sad my total daily life. So, I commenced manifesting doing the job in video. Shortly, I begun as a video clip producer and then I was on Television [in Summer House]. Now I’m just in my foolish goose period with comedy and podcasting.

ED: What was that changeover like? Did you have any anticipations, likely into it?

HB: I’m a business believer in not having a 5-yr program. My aim was I want to wake up and do what’s fun for me. I appreciate creating men and women chortle, but I in no way believed I could make a residing being amusing. But when I obtained an prospect to get started earning comedy video clips for operate, it arrived simple and organic to me. You come to feel it in your gut when you belong someplace.

I’ve finished other matters that unsuccessful ’cause I was so obsessed with winning or accomplishing nicely. But with this, if I was too obsessed with the final result, it would be creatively stunting. The joy I get is from emotion like my voice is becoming heard and the believed that I could make an individual come to feel significantly less by yourself. I’m not Mother Teresa, but that is what I get off on.

ED: You have gotten huge on TikTok, and your account now has 2.6 million followers and 139.7 million likes. What has the response been like to your account blowing up?

HB: For the most component, the feedback have been great due to the fact it is really distinct that every thing I’m publishing is comedy. So, persons are just reacting to that. But when it goes way too viral, the incels locate the movie and start off commenting “Women aren’t amusing.”

It’s a minimal terrifying. Like, what time interval are we in? You can say you really do not come across my movie amusing, but why do we have to set the blame on an total gender? Never provide all girls into this.

ED: How have the crowds at your comedy displays modified because you commenced likely viral on TikTok?

HB: It is f*cking mad simply because the TikTok algorithm is so good. It actually finds the persons who not only have a equivalent perception of humor but could also be my pals. I’m extremely biased, but the girls who appear to my exhibit are all warm, profitable, neat, self-deprecating, nervous girlies. I really feel like I’m at brunch chatting to my close friends.

Now, since I have been joking extra about boyfriends and courting, a whole lot far more adult males have been coming to displays, too, mainly because they enjoy having built exciting of. I really like that. I consider the audience is a lot more pleasurable when it is a mix ’cause there’s stress and chemistry to get the job done off of.

ED: You perform off that stress that in your “Han on the Street” movies, far too. How do you choose who to ask what?

HB: I check with adult males thoughts that make them awkward. That was the premise at initially. After I got started off, my woman pals referred to as me out and had been like, “Hey, you’ve acquired to cease publishing dudes. What about supporting other ladies?” I did not want to make entertaining of them, even though, so I had to consider a second to figure out how to do it in a funny way.

Then, I understood these ladies are prepared to converse about definitely embarrassing stuff. My most-seen video on TikTok (with 33 million views) is me inquiring women of all ages how generally they shave their cooch. When do you really see genuine women of all ages in the road speaking about that? So, with the adult men, it is a minor much more about creating exciting of them. For gals, it is focused on the stuff we’re normally fearful to talk about.

We have to stop taking ourselves and intercourse so significantly… It is uncomfortable, it is uncomfortable, it is imperfect.

ED: Some of your inquiries like “Was dropping your virginity a good experience?” and “Have you ever faked an orgasm?” are definitely private. Why do you assume it is crucial to check with these kinds of issues about sexual intercourse?

HB: Just like almost everything in lifestyle, sexual intercourse has social norms. For so lengthy, persons — women of all ages, specifically — were not talking about it enough. So numerous of my pals didn’t masturbate for the to start with time right until university, and which is mainly because it’s so taboo to speak about women’s sexual pleasure and sexual well being. I’m hoping to break the taboo by getting more voices converse about it. Even with the coochie-shaving online video, so quite a few girls in the comments have been like, “Wait, I feel so substantially greater about myself. I believed I experienced to generally seem like a bare mole rat.”

Humor makes these conversations palatable. We have to cease taking ourselves and intercourse so severely, as if sex is normally this stunning, hot, sexy, wonderful thing. It’s not. It is uncomfortable, it is embarrassing, it is imperfect.

ED: Do the interviews at any time transform your perspective? Or do you adjust theirs?

HB: When I ask a male about physique counts and he’s like “Ew, I really don’t want a lady who’s experienced much too many boyfriends,” I like to be able to come back again at that. I really like the notion of persons with distinctive ideologies truly owning a dialogue, and I surely test to sneak in my feminist takes. By the time we’re completed chatting, they all develop into feminist icons.

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.