Sabrina Brier is That Friend

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The first TikTok of Sabrina Brier’s I came across was one titled: “The Friend Who Gives You Ruthless Boy Advice.” The video featured what would become signature of Brier’s videos: her standing in front of the camera while an offscreen friend talks to her. I remember it so distinctly because it was summer ‘22, a weird period of my life when I too was in need of a verbal shoulder shaking from a friend who would tell me like Brier bluntly told her friend: “you look pathetic!”

Whether it was fate or simply the algorithm hellbent on torturing me, Brier and I would laugh about how seemingly kismet that video felt for the both of us when we talk about it three years after the fact. (“We joke about "‘big brother’ trying to sell you products but then there’s big brother trying to be your therapist,” Brier jokes.) For Brier, that video marked the first time one of her TikToks went viral on Twitter after I posted it, aiding in what would be her successful internet comedy career. She steadily became a breakout star amongst the sea of TikTok comedians doing slice of life comedy about the funny, and at times triggering, banalities of adult friendships. Clips of her saying a high pitched and befuddled “oh!” have accrued a fanbase of its own and gifs of her videos have become commonplace all over the internet. A recent one of her videos “The Friend Who is Desperate to Bring Back Casual Hang” caused a bit of a stir on Twitter with one of the top comments saying: “This isn’t even funny this is just sad.”

This past January, Brier expanded upon her online friend series with an audiobook with Simon and Schuster titled That Friend. For many loyal followers of Brier’s content, they will recognize some of the characters and scenarios that make it in the book, but the plotline is a fully fleshed out one. The Sabrina of the audio series isn’t the Sabrina of real life per se. That Friend’s Sabrina is a podcaster, while the Sabrina of real life is a Tiktoker and professional actress whose credits include Abbott Elementary and Steven Soderberg’s Code Z. The Sabrina of That Friend is fledgling in her search for identity and a steady career to appease her father who is threatening to cut her off financially. In real life, Sabrina always knew she wanted to be an actress. Born to a mother who is a playwright and a high school theater teacher, Brier was always destined to be an entertainer. 

I spoke to Brier about her new audiobook That Friend, her burgeoning career, and her friends, both real and fictional.

Throughout the book, the character of Sabrina talks a lot about wanting her career to be legitimized, whether by institutions or by her father. Have you experienced personal frustration when people view you as a “real” comedian and actress only now because you've been on traditional TV versus when you're just on the internet?

I think that there's gotta be some subconscious thing there that was infused into the story. There's a part of that I think comes from back when I was in my early twenties and I moved to New York and I was pursuing this industry as an assistant. And I think there's a little bit of those feelings of angst and, you know, “see me,” “everyone look at me,” “see me for what I can do,” but also like needing to actually go do the thing.

I think there's a little bit of inspo from my early experiences in New York, but I think you're right that there's probably, you know, some inspo too when it comes to my current desire for legitimization and also with that conflict of what really even is that and how as an artist and a creative and a person who makes things, you really have to learn to not focus as much on that as you are on like your inner voice and the things that you just wanna make.

Do you presently feel that your work has been affirmed by either yourself or others you respect?

It's like such an internal imposter syndrome thing that as I have worked on it inside, I do feel [my career] is legitimate now. I think it's also been this journey of just going with the flow of how much the tides are turning. Especially coming from such a traditional media space as an assistant, you do start to be like: What am I doing? What is this? This is so silly. This is on the internet. This doesn't feel real. But then like the reality is it is real. It is how I financially support myself and that's real. Right? And I think I would say the answer is yes, but it has definitely been because it's taken a journey to get there. 

The Sabrina of the audio series is a bit wayward in her pursuit of identity in both her career and life. Is that something that resonated with an early version of you? 

I think that I don't resonate with her “I don't know who I am” and “I'm afraid to say what I wanna be” because I would say I was the opposite of that growing up. Like I was obsessive about the fact that I wanted to be an actress and I let everyone know it, but I do resonate with procrastination and how hard it can be to match your energy and the reality of the logistics of your life to your dreams. Especially in today's world where it's like you have to have a day job. Like balancing those things, especially when I was an assistant, I always had anxiety about not being productive enough, not doing enough, and I still get those feelings.

How did you decide to expand your TikTok series into an audiobook? 

So I was approached by Simon and Schuster by this incredible woman, Lara [Blackman], who was a fan of my content and kind of just like was a girl who gets it when it came to my content and could really see the long form potential of things that I also was trying to figure out on my end. And she was like: Would you ever want to go audio? Like is that something you would ever be interested in? Because we would love to talk to you about that. And I was like, yeah, because I wasn't sure exactly at that point. Like having a TV show is definitely a dream of mine and I was more so focused on that end goal of things and this felt like this amazing sort of middle step of like my first big project, putting things together in a real way, producing something in a real way. And so really she gets credit for like that initial idea. And then I was the one who was like, okay, well let me make it episodic. I want this to be totally fictional. I want this to be a cast of characters. We kind of came together with the brainchild.

Are you hoping to do any more audio work in the future? 

I would love to do some voice acting in another project. I think that would be so fun. I would say that when it comes to the more traditional publishing world of books, I feel like this was such an amazing experience, and I'm very big on kind of like, okay, I did this and then kind of veering somewhere else to something different.

But not to say I wouldn't come back to that eventually, but I would say in the future, I'm more so focused right now on developing with Awesomeness [TV]. Maybe, you know, getting more into the feature film space and dipping my toes back into the theater space, things like that.

What else are you hoping to say with this series in a future adaptation? 

I love the idea of creating a show that's very aspirational in the sense of community and friendship. I love shows like that. I obviously grew up watching Girls and Sex In The City. You know, having that feeling where you turn on the TV and you're like, those are my friends and I'm living their lives with them. I think that my online material is already like that, and I really want the opportunity to expand on those stories. 

 When did comedy start for you? 

I always was like, I wanna be an actress, but in my mind, that was like being dramatic on a stage. Like I wasn't thinking of myself as a comedy person, even though it was in my blood a bit. My mom, she started out also acting when she was living in Philadelphia when she was young and she had like a sketch group, so she already had done the comedy thing and it's just never something I even thought of myself as being able to do. 

But then I ended up at a women's college where — I think I would've been way too intimidated at a co-ed school to audition for improv or stand up, things like that — but at my women's college, I was like okay I want more performance opportunity maybe I’ll try improv. And I was really scared and then very quickly I was like, oh I love this. I was the president my senior year. It really became the kind of pinnacle experience for me of going to Smith was doing comedy.

And then when I moved to New York, I continued that. I started taking classes at the Upright Citizens Brigade. And really was still kind of teetering between like, okay, I love performing comedy and let me learn this beast, but also like I have such a love for dramatic works as well and I wanna write more of that stuff as well. Then of course when I started taking off online things became even more comedy centric, and then I took that energy into the more official Brooklyn comedy scene.

Rachel Dratch makes a cameo in your audiobook as herself. Was she one of your early idols when it came to comedy?

Yeah I was. It's actually just like in [That Friend.] My friend and I really were obsessed with [her Saturday Night Live character] Debbie Downer in high school. When I was in high school, it was also a little after like the Kristen Wiig era, and I would definitely say SNL and watching the funny women like the Iconic Rachel on that show was very inspiring and exciting. I don't think at the time I thought that's what the path I was gonna take, but I always worshiped her and worshiped those women. 

 And how did she come onto this series?

I have a video that I did with my actual best friend from college who I did improv with, Isabella and we have this video where it's like when you and your bestie are communicating and it's like my friend and I holding each other's hands and we're like looking at each other intensely. She had seen that video and thought it was a riot and like at’ed me. Then I messaged her, I was like: “Oh my God, hello. Like, I'm obsessed with you.” And she was like, I love that video. Like it reminds me of me and my friend. And then when it came time for the audiobook, I reached out to her and was like, is there any way you like, are available to do this? And she was so gracious about it.

And your book is very star-studded, but I was looking up some of the other voice actors and they are some of the people that have appeared in your videos. So are those your old friends?

Yes! Isabella Tagliati is a wonderful actress and one of my best friends from Smith [College], we did improv together. She plays Bella, she plays Caitlin, the waitress, and she plays the Italian waiter 'cause she's Italian. So I was like, gimme some accent girl.

My friend Rachel Coster, who I do comedy with in New York, and who is the host of Boy Room, which is this incredible online series, played Jessica. So it was definitely a mix of new friends, old friends. Even some of those star studded people like Anthony Ramos, Danielle Brooks — those are folks I worked for when I was an assistant.

In the That Friend, your friends in the series are upset about you using them for inspiration. Do your real life friends get upset when they see any of your tiktoks? 

I definitely use them, but I am not as shameless as the character is about it. For example, in [That Friend] with the voice note dilemma, that happens where [my character] basically in this very unashamed way tells like a very realistic story of something that happened with a friend and her ex — that is based on real life where there really was a bodega run in with my friend's ex and like another friend of ours sent a scathing voice note about it and we were all like, this is amazing and hilarious.

Then I very much was like — and let me know when I can use this. At a certain point she was like you're free to use it. I'm so much more communicative with my friends about when I do use their stories than my character is but at the same time, I think there's a little bit of funny realism of, sometimes it'll be subconscious. I'll be with a friend complaining about something or someone, and then I don't even realize I'm infusing it into a TikTok. And then later my friend's like that was kind of like the thing we were talking about. And I'm like, oops. So there's definitely like a blurry line between realism and this material in ways.

But I have been lucky to have the most incredible friends, they've been so supportive. I wouldn't have a platform if it weren't for them because like they started off helping me with all of my videos. But I am definitely a much more thoughtful friend than my character.

And who are you hoping to work with in the future?

I'm so ready to work with Caleb Heron, who is the best ever. I have something I'm writing and I'm like Caleb's gonna be in this. I have another friend, Michael Breslin, who's a director and a writer of Circle Jerk fame, and he's incredible. Like, again, it's really I think just comes from these organic relationships I have with people. My friend Zach Schiffman, who is an incredible writer for the New York Mag and a comedy writer and all we do is talk and muse on things, but we just haven't actually made a thing together.

I think it's just so exciting to look at that world of friends you have around you. It's almost overwhelming. You're like, look at all these brilliant people how do I work with you next? 

And for my last question, what kind of friend are you?

I would say I am definitely very loyal and ride or die. I mean, a lot of my friends that I am spending time with often are people I went to summer camp with. Last night I got drinks with a friend who I've known since we were ten.  I would also say I'm a very opinionated, advice friend who maybe you don't always wanna hear it kind of thing. Maybe sometimes I'm too opinionated and then I have to watch myself. I would say I am overly caring sometimes to the point of being intrusive.