Some people have jobs so cool we'd actually enjoy attending their marathon Zoom meetings. Even the ones that could totally have been an email.
Not to say we don't cherish our all-important responsibility of bringing you every last piece of need-to-know information about the casts of Bridgerton and The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City, but we don't have our own glam squad or a Rolodex filled with famous names, now do we?
But the impossibly cool people we'll be profiling in E! News' latest series totally do. Plus access to things like private drivers, designer garb and the type of professional titles we'd drop with wild abandon at parties, dinner dates or while chatting with the barista at Starbucks. Welcome to A Day in the Life...
At just 25, Manny MUA was named Maybelline's first-ever male brand ambassador thanks to his rabid social media following and popular online tutorials. Two years later, he launched his own cosmetics brand, Lunar Beauty.
And yet his favorite part about being a YouTube sensation, makeup artist, beauty pioneer and now podcast host, having recently launched Fool Coverage with fellow influencer and BFF Laura Lee—all of which he'll talk about during E! True Hollywood Story's new episode "Pretty Ugly" about beauty influencers on Monday, Nov. 8—is the opportunity to, uh, make up his own schedule.
"I would say definitely the freedom that it gives me," he admits in an exclusive interview with E! News, "because I love getting to kind of just do whatever it is I want. Mind you, of course I'm still very aware and I plan things out and I'm still busy as f--k, but it's stuff that I enjoy doing for the most part."
Like, say, testing out swatches for Lunar Beauty, the company he founded in 2018, "because I felt like the aesthetic of what I liked, I didn't see out in the makeup space." Or spending 90 some minutes shooting the s--t with Lee about what's going on in their industry.
And, of course, there's time in between to hit the gym, order Postmates and spend hours scrolling through YouTube vids. The 30-year-old beauty sensation walks E! News through each step (skincare routine included!) of a recent day.
10 a.m. (PST) Yes, he's sure to get his beauty sleep. But the real reason Manny's body wakes him each day between 9:30 and 10 is "because I'm usually up the night before, 'til, like, 2," he explains. "I'm not really a morning person."
After scrolling through his phone ("I know it's bad and I shouldn't do that, but I totally do," he admits), playing with poodle Zaya and brushing his teeth, "I check my calendar, because I need to focus on what I actually have to do," he shares. "If I have a busy day, I'm like, 'I'm going back to bed.' But if it's a chill day, then I'm like, 'Cool, let's get this thing going.'"
11 a.m. Nibbling on a Clif Bar ("I'm not a huge breakfast eater, because my stomach's already like, no baby we're not putting anything in here"), he makes the half-hour trip to his gym, spending two hours getting in strength training ("My favorite is to work out my chest and my arms") and that dreaded cardio.
"It's the worst!" he grumbles. "I'm like, 'Where is my runner's high? Give it to me!'"
2 p.m. He makes sure to wrap up his sweat session in time to avoid L.A.'s rush hour traffic and expertly performs his beauty routine en route to recording his podcast with Laura. "I get ready in my car," he says, "like a quick, easy, basic-ass beat, like girl on the go."
His time-saving means he can squeeze in a trip to grab his favorite boba tea and a chicken salad from El Pollo Loco: "My go-to lunch routine."
3 p.m. At his and Laura's rental studio, he's ready to talk about whether family vloggers are exploiting their kids for clout—a topic he doesn't intend to gloss over. "A day before, we'll be like okay, 'What's the little baby outline?'" he explains of their prep. "We don't want to get too much into it, because we don't want to lose the authenticity of it, but we also want to have, like, a little path to hold on to."
Having spent seven years perfecting his YouTube channel, Manny was eager for the opportunity to dig deep with his pal. "The podcast world is literally where people could go to dissect things and talk about real topics," he notes. "And so for us, it was a perfect fit. Like, we were already wanting to be able to just be more candid with our conversations and basically put people into conversations that me and her have all the time. Like this is what we talk about, so you guys can be included in it."
5 p.m. Back at home, he continues to show his true colors, testing out new products he's received for his Lunar Beauty brand "to make sure that they're up to standard" ahead of a 2022 release. Which means he has "the makeup on my arm or on my eyes or whatever for a couple hours just to make sure that it's reacting well," he explains. "I always feel so accomplished when I've written out my little things of what I like, what I don't like and I send it over and I'm like, 'This is to be changed.'"
The idea for Lunar Beauty first sparked after he'd done a few projects with other makeup brands, "And I was like, 'Wait, I can do this like for a living, instead of just doing it in collaboration.'"
7 p.m. The beauty of working for yourself? "At, like, 7 o'clock, I'm like, 'Okay, I'm over it,'" he notes, declaring it time to order some Chipotle through Postmates and veg. "I'm like, my lunch was healthy-ish, so, f--k it, you know?'" he jokes. "It's all about balance. And I did cardio at the gym so I deserve it."
TV is his favorite way to unwind ("It's a nice distraction from your life") and his current obsessions include Bachelor in Paradise, American Horror Story and Motherland: Fort Salem. "While I'm watching, I'll scroll through emails," he says of catching up on the day's happenings. "Throughout the day I will check here and there, but I'll do a more of honed-in focus at nighttime."
11 p.m. Four hours of binging later, it's time for a change of scenery, so Manny moves upstairs to grab his Nintendo Switch to "play some Super Smash Brothers and try to beat some kids online."
Then it's time for a long look in the mirror as he does his skincare routine. "I'll do the whole thing," he notes. "Cleansing toning, serum, moisturizer, night cream." His current rotation of favorites includes products from CosRX, Hendrickson, Paula's Choice and a heavy retinol every four days. "I love Hendrickson toner and I use that and then I'll love a Paula's Choice SPF," he explains. "And I do switch out my stuff so often because I do try out so many things."
To entertain himself while he cleanses, he'll pull up his YouTube "and just kind of scroll through my subscription feed, and see if there's anything that interests me," he says. "I try to be as plugged in as possible without being too overly stimulated."
After all, this is what he does for a living, a fact that still leaves him in awe. "I think that's the part that's really, really fun: Getting to actually do what I want to do and be independent and not have a boss and all that stuff," he says of his gig. "Everyone wants that, I think."
(Originally published Oct. 21, 2021 at 9 a.m. PT)