Sabrina Brier dishes on her viral TikTok videos, funny new audiobook 'That Friend'
The one who's a little too invested in your friendship, a little too mad at your ex, a little too ... everything. At least that's her persona on TikTok and her new audiobook, "That Friend" (Simon & Schuster), out Tuesday.
Brier's audiobook, a fictional story that she also narrates, tells the story of Sabrina, a woman navigating that postgrad, amorphous life in New York with her three best friends, all of whom seem to have it more together than she does. As she chases success as a podcaster, she clashes with friends and emotional chaos ensues.
Brier landed an impressive list of actors for the full-cast narration. Among the celebrities lending their voices are Rachel Zegler (upcoming "Snow White," "West Side Story") Lukas Gage ("You," "The White Lotus"), Nicola Coughlan ("Bridgerton," "Derry Girls") and Anthony Ramos ("In the Heights," "Hamilton").
Brier wanted her audiobook to be "like a TV series, but in your ears," the Connecticut native, 30, tells USA TODAY.
That's not surprising given her work in TV, including an internship on ABC's "Scandal" and a guest spot on "Abbott Elementary" with Quinta Brunson, one of her idols. Brier, like Brunson, knows how to make people laugh. Her quick, quippy TikToks where she acts like an annoying friend have become a pop-culture staple.
"I didn't know exactly what I was doing at first," she says of her online presence. "I just knew I was hungry to perform and write and have an audience. Before that, I really was an assistant running around the city getting coffees and laundry and stuff like that. I was hungry for that visibility and so I started putting stuff online but always with the idea that this can be a longer story, a bigger piece eventually."
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Brier's audiobook is like a rom-com for a friend group. Sabrina accidentally steals an opportunity from a friend. That guy she's really isn't into her – like, at all – and everyone knows it but her. She focuses too much on her own ambitions that she fails to see the bigger picture.
Brier says the characters' "neurotic feelings" were "pulled from being an assistant in New York postgrad, wanting such a big life with big dreams and having absolutely no idea how I was going to get there and probably being a little cray cray because of that."
Brier's evolving friendships and ambition were great source material, too.
"I always am examining my friendships around me, and I think it's sometimes inevitable to feel like you're maybe always making a mistake, not doing enough or you're not present enough," she says. "I think especially – I turned 30 recently – and I think life becoming more real, you start to have to reframe friendships with this understanding of each other and what you're both going through as a young professional trying to climb and build a life for yourself."
Her audiobook character Sabrina is far more grounded than the woman Brier plays on TikTok. "We try to really balance (the audiobook) with much more heartfelt, grounded moments of the character," she says, adding she relates to the audiobook Sabrina more than her TikTok character.
Speaking of relatable, how does she feel about the comment section on her videos?
"I've learned so much as a writer, creator and actor over the past few years of being online from the comment section, from the fans," she says. "Having insights into something that I've put out there... audiences are really smart and we have to listen to the audience. It should be us and the audience back and forth. And I think that's why TikTok is so fun because there is no place where it's more like that." It's good, then, the platform is still around for people like Brier (for now).
Brier spent roughly eight years living in New York, and friendships are the beating heart of her life in the city. They were also fellow architects of her brand. "They were the ones out in 10-degree weather" while she begged them to record TikTok clips.
"I think you go off and you go to work and you go on the subway and you're figuring it all out. But at the end of the day, in some way, shape or form, you're coming back to your friends," she says.
She's that friend, after all.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Sabrina Brier dishes on viral TikToks, audiobook 'That Friend'
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