Halfway through a lunchtime interview at a Brooklyn café in Williamsburg, Sabrina Brier is approached by a fan. This is something of a common occurrence for the 30-year-old Connecticut-born comedian, even if the vast majority of the people in this dining room — or, for that matter, this city — have no idea who she is.
“It reminds me of when I was a camp counselor,” she says of the interruption. “You have to lean into the fact that you enjoy holding court. It’s one of my favorite parts of living in New York.”
Brier, for those not in the know, is a TikTok star. You may have seen some of her GIFs (like the one of her saying, “Oh!”), bumped into some of her sponsored content (for Subway, Nuuly and Bumble) or enjoyed one of her viral “That Friend” videos (in which she parodies a variety of specific, instantly recognizable types of white women, like “That friend who is doing Dry January” or “That friend who hates when you don’t take her dating advice”).
Altogether, these online bits have helped Brier build a solid, if not particularly spectacular, social media audience — about a million followers — and have landed her on several Creators Power Lists (including THR‘s last year). What makes Brier a little different, though — the reason you’re reading about her right now — is that she may have just invented a whole new type of fame. She may be the world’s first audiobook star.
This week, Simon & Schuster released That Friend, a four-hour aural performance piece about a fictional social media influencer whose personal life is crumbling just as her career as an online advice podcaster is taking off. Technically, it’s being sold as an audiobook — except there won’t be any book. It’s audio only. And it’s not just Brier doing the reading; she’s wrangled a bunch of stars to perform with her, including Lukas Gage, Rachel Zegler, Nicola Coughlan and Anthony Ramos.
“I used to get Anthony’s dry cleaning and now he’s performing a part I wrote,” she says. “I was so obsessed with Hamilton, I still can’t believe he even knows my name, much less that I got to sit across from him in a recording booth.”
She picked up Ramos’ laundry during a gig as Door 24 talent manager Jill McGrath’s assistant (McGrath repped Ramos), Brier’s first job after graduating from Smith College in 2017. She did the usual coffee runs and car-service scheduling but also helped edit audition tapes and sat in during her boss’ business calls. The job made her realize she wanted to one day create — and star in — her own TV show. So, Brier left Door 24 after two years to become a writers assistant on the Steven Soderbergh web series Command Z and began flexing her own creative muscles by making TikTok videos on the side. Before long, those videos started taking off.
Brier as a substitute teacher on Abbott Elementary.
Gilles Mingasson/Disney
“When I first went viral, I was working as an assistant,” she says. “I would be running an errand, with a FedEx box in my arms, and a fan would stop me while I’m trying to figure out how to mail my boss’ package.”
Eventually, her comedy skits blew up enough that McGrath, with whom she’d kept in touch, decided to sign Brier as a client. “All of her other clients went to, like, Yale Drama, they can sing, they’re 7 feet tall,” she says. “I’m just this little funny girl.”
The idea for the audiobook was born out of a cold call from a fan who happened to be a Simon & Schuster editor and who saw longform potential in Brier’s TikToks. Normally, a book deal might have ensued, but Brier and the editor came up with the notion of releasing an audio-only narrative, like an old-timey radio play, only updated for the digital age. What Brier ended up writing was a layered millennial story with a full cast of actors, most of them hired from McGrath’s roster. “I knew it couldn’t be [four hours and 7 minutes] of me yapping,” she says.
Beyond the creative challenge of pioneering a potential new publishing genre, Brier’s audio-only book also offers a bit of career diversification, a safety net for uncertain times. “There was a slight feeling of racing against the clock of TikTok going away. I’m lucky enough to have spaces where I can continue to make money even after a ban,” she goes on, referring to some other recent gigs, like a guest role as a substitute teacher on Abbott Elementary. “But people are out here on TikTok paying off their student loans. It’s sad to think that could go away.”
For the moment, at least, TikTok’s future seems relatively bullish — as does Brier’s. “I’ve always been obsessed with the idea of achieving legitimacy in the industry, but I’ve learned that this career is not about getting every single person to like you,” she says as she finishes her lunch with no further interruptions. “That’s never going to happen. It’s about finding a few people who really get you.”
This story appeared in the Feb. 5 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.
