Tea Hacic-Vlahovic on Talking Rats, the Death of Partying and Her New Book

Words: Gina Tonic

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Tea Hačić-Vlahović was born to be a star. I know this because I’ve watched her evolution into one in the most intimate way that a person can: Through following each other online for over a decade. Tea has always presented herself as someone who loves two things: Self expression and partying. When most of us slid between the sheets after a long night at the club to chew out our final gurns in private, Tea took to her keyboard to type lengthy ponderings on Blogspot, anonymous agony aunt answers on Tumblr under the alias of Sugar Tits, and a Vice Italy column.

It was inevitable that a woman who seemingly never slept and put so much effort into reaching out into the world, would be the one out of the close knit Tumblr community that we had that would make it, and I was thrilled whenever my doom scrolling would show Tea graduating from live performances in Harlem art galleries to publishing much acclaimed novels. I caught up with Tea as she works on her third book, a story with a talking rat, a bicoastal writer and a surprisingly empathetic male narrative.

GT: The last time we saw you was in New York in 2015. Everything just feels so different compared to that, don't you think? I don't know if that's just part of getting older or if the world has genuinely changed so much?

T H-V: Well, I think no one ever wants to talk about the pandemic anymore but during COVID, I felt the world was going to really change. This was like, a once in a lifetime, once in a generation opportunity for everyone to be like, ‘Oh, maybe like the way we've been living sucks. And we need to reconsider capitalism, we need to reconsider how often we all need to go to work, we need to take care of each other.’ I thought that after the lockdown the world would be a better place. I'm such an optimistic idiot. 

And after the lockdown, as we all know, things stayed the same, but worse. Things just got like a shittier version of what they were before. And I think that people really lost partying. For me at least, parties were a place where people would go and like, even without speaking about it, they would go to share their joy and their hopes, and anything can happen at a party – I might find a lover, I might find my next collaborator, I might just find an inspiration for a new outfit or haircut, whatever new track that I love. And now I think just after the letdown of seeing the world didn't become a better place even after that once in a lifetime opportunity, it’s kind of like, ‘What's the fucking point?’ 

Something has gone. And maybe also just because during lockdown, all of the kids got so into TikTok - what else were they going to fucking do? I just think the importance of community, the physical community of parties, it's kind of gone. What do you think of that? 

I think we've just missed out on a whole generation of partiers, like people who prefer going outside. I feel like there was always that thing, especially when I was growing up that there was like, kind of like the subsection of kids who did prefer being inside, but that would last like three years. And then you'd like, smoke weed for the first time. Do you know what I mean? Like it would change. Whereas now, the kids who are internet focused are so internet focused.

It's not their fault, but when you're a teenager you're supposed to be doing the dumbest shit ever. And they were stuck at home and they got into so much social justice shit instead of just figuring out if they could survive a night in a park on a bench you know?

It’s something that we always try to talk about on the podcast. Like, it's not even these kids’ fault, it's literally the repercussions of so much fucking horrible shit going on. I can't imagine being like a teenager and Trump being in office – we were like, the Obama generation, and everything seemed possible.

We really thought… [laughs] What a bunch of dummies! No, I really still do think that we can pull ourselves out of the mess of the world. It's just like, she just really keeps getting worse. And it really sucks. But I believe in the kids. I believe in science. I believe that we can maybe turn things around and still have a lush, green paradise full of parties, and great magazines.

That's exactly what I need to hear because I'm so like, ‘Oh, I don't need a pension, the sun's gonna eat us all.’ We just did a podcast episode about how the internet isn't even usable anymore. Everything's got so many ads or bots, or like, crypto involved in it. 

I saw this tweet and it really reverberated around my brain. It said, ‘In like 100 years, they're gonna look back and be like, ‘As if everyone used to go on the internet and just spend their days. That's so embarrassing.’’ And I just don't know which way it's gonna fall. It either will be fully technological, or it will go back to basics, but I wondered what you think?

Luckily, I'm old enough that I was able to already see several platforms die. I'm young enough that I was at the right moment. I used to be a columnist for Vice, and I used to be a Tumblr girl, and Blogspot. All of those are dead now. And so that's why when kids today are like so on TikTok or Instagram, I don't want to be a party pooper, but I want them to know, like, I know, this seems like the only thing that is real, but it's actually so not. They can disappear at any moment and you can lose everything. If everything is on that app for you, you can lose everything. 

I believe and I hope that TikTok will die off. I hope that all of it will die off. But I know that we're going to keep coming up with new versions of the internet. I think that ultimately even though I've lost a lot of my work to the internet, that is just the internet. I think it's ultimately a good thing because it shows that people keep moving past it, and being kind of over it, and it keeps failing in a very human way. 

I miss blogging, when I would go out and live my life, and then come home and blog about it. And now it's just like you're already living your life with the blog attached to you like and you're already projecting what kind of photo you're going to post about the park? I don't like living that way. But also, I post Reels because sometimes I'm genuinely inspired to and sometimes but whenever I watch other people's Reels I'm like, “Isn't it so fucked up how we are all spending our time mostly for free, creating this content to trap each other?” We're all doing it to each other and we're all suffering from it. But also I really love seeing how funny people are. Then I’m like, “What the fuck have I been doing the past two hours?”

How is your current book going? What is it about? 

It's loosely based on what happened after Giancarlo DiTrapano [Tea’s former publisher] died. I went to the memorial in New York. The character in this book, she's loosely based on me, but this is more fiction than I've ever written - my other two books are basically based completely on my life. 

This one is a very fictionalised version of what it's like to be a writer between LA and New York, all of the bullshit in that industry. And then a lot of like, social commentary, it's a bit of a satire. And that it's the first time ever that I'm writing from a male perspective. I have two male characters that actually get their own point of view in the story, and I'm really excited about these characters. They're a bit of a surprise. I don't want to spoil that. Oh, and then there's a rat, of course, you know, there needs to be some animal. So I'm really excited about this one. It's very different from the other stuff I've done. But I think it's the best thing I've done. I don't know when it's going to be out yet. You know, these things take forever, but hopefully, it'll be out soon.

Writers are always collecting references that make up their characters and I think that's so reflective of real life – you know your best mate by like their tea order, or how annoying they are in restaurants. It’s like that bit in When Harry Met Sally when he tells her everything he loves. And I was wondering what are the top five references that make you up?

So, Cartoon Network in the 90s shaped me fundamentally. You know, Cow and Chicken, and Scooby Doo. Then I'm gonna say a similar thing, Adult Swim in the early 2000s. So like,

Aqua Teen Hunger Force, SEALAB 2021. I loved comic books too, I still do, in particular Alex Schubert and especially his book BLOBBY BOYS.

Of course, my favourite album, the album that turned me into a punk rocker: The Bouncing Souls – Hopeless Romantic. It changed my life. It really shaped who I wanted to be as a person. Then I would say, I mean, Lady Gaga when she first started out. When I was living in alone in Milan, I felt like every single song she wrote was written for me, every single fucking song. I was like, “She's my David Bowie.” She's a lot of our David Bowies for sure. 

And then my dog Winkle because she inspires me every day and reminds me to just like, stretch, smell the dirt, and be just as cute and cosy as possible. Because nothing else really matters. You know, whenever I'm crying over some work thing, and I'm just patting her and she's looking at me like, “Why are you crying? Bitch, we have food. We have water. The AC is on. Scratch my belly now. She's my daily reference for sure.

Art director and post production: Francesco Saverio Tani | Photographer: Antonio Giancaspro | Stylist: Davide Andreatta | Set designer: Irene Barcarolo | Styling Assistant: Carlotta Campus