If you're an avid TikTok-scroller with any taste, there's a good chance you've seen the usernames @ladyefron and @fibula grace your for you page. @ladyefron, aka Brooke Averick, and @fibula, aka Connor Wood, are two lovable and hilarious content creators who have risen to prominence through their social media prowess. While each have their own unique interests and ever-growing personal platforms, they come together to form quite the dynamic podcasting duo.
Brooke and Connor Make A Podcast, hosted by Brooke and Connor, is a charming, quirky, and laugh-out-loud funny podcast produced by TMG Studios. Whether they're breaking down pop culture moments, asking the questions others are too afraid to ask, or getting into a friendly debate, Brooke and Connor know how to draw their listeners in and make them feel like old friends invited along for the ride. We had the chance to sit down with Brooke and Connor to discuss their lives as internet personalities, comedians, and podcasters, plus we got to hear about some of their exciting upcoming projects.
1. Please introduce yourselves and give a little summary of who you are and what you’re known for.
Brooke: I'm Brooke Averick and I live in Los Angeles. I used to be a pre-school teacher, and then when COVID hit, I downloaded TikTok, and then I had a viral video and quit my job. Also, I have a pet guinea pig named Frankie.
Connor: I'm Connor Wood and I'm originally from Texas. I worked in tech before, and now I'm sort of on the other side of tech. I used to be the person who I work with now. And, I'm a comedian. We do TikTok, we do comedy, and we're podcasters.
2. What inspired you to start this podcast, and how did the two of you become co-hosts?
Connor: We weren't inspired to start a podcast as much as we were led into it and given the opportunity to do it. Actually, Brooke and Connor Make A Podcast was our second time trying to make a podcast, and my third time trying to make a podcast. I had a podcast with iHeartRadio alongside Remi Bader for a blip, but this is the one that really stuck. Cody Ko reached out and asked, 'Would you guys want to do this?" and I was like, "Yeah, I think we would!" And then we tried it, and afterward, we were like, "I don't know if that's for us." Then, we started to get into a little bit of a stride, and that stride I'm talking about would be our worst day of podcasting ever now, looking back. But, you just have to do it! And then we figured it out. I feel like I'm more inspired by our podcast now than I was when we started it.
Brooke: We saw a clip of the first episode recently and it was like actual torture. So, it's really nice to see how far we've come.
3. If you had to summarize the pod in a single tweet, what would the tweet say?
Brooke: "It's a podcast about nothing and everything, all at once," or "Background noise meets philosophy."
BuzzFeed: Very Seinfeld-esque. For me, listening to your podcast feels like I'm hanging out with my friends.
Connor: For me, that's exactly what I wanted. My old jobs were so monotonous and I was looking at Excel all day, and all I wanted was to find a podcast with however many people just talking about anything so that I could feel like I was at home with my friends killing time.
4. What three words come to mind when you think of your co-host?
Connor: Patient. Small-but-mighty, if I can count that as one. I'll say it really fast so it's one word. Witty.
Brooke: Smooth, like physically. We always talk about Connor "giving pebble" because he has no pores and baby-smooth skin. So, smooth like pottery. Also, charismatic. And quick.
5. If you each had to choose a song to describe your relationship with one another, what song would you choose and why?
Brooke: The music video, more specifically: The Glee version of "Smooth Criminal."
Connor: What was that Elton John song we listened to when we lived together? One of the Elton John classics, I would say. "Your Song." We flew way too close to the sun with Elton, but like, that's so us.
6. What’s the weirdest thing you’ve ever googled for the podcast?
Brooke: There's so many!
Connor: Men's versus women's urethra size is probably up there. That one was crazy. I know there's some we don't even google on the work computer because we don't want to get the office computers flagged. Oh, Wet Goddess, for sure.
Brooke: Oh, we always google Wet Goddess.
Connor: That's someone who had an emotional—
Brooke: –and physical
Connor: Well, we don't know that for sure...
Brooke: Oh, I thought that was the point of the book?
Connor: They were intimate...yeah. Wet Goddess is a story about a person who had a relationship with a dolphin. We've searched that so many times that we should be flagged. I'm gonna order the paperback so we can stop googling it. Oh, also NATO.
Brooke: But that's not weird.
Connor: I think it's weird that we don't know what it is.
7. What are some items in your recent search history right now?
Brooke: The last thing I googled was "Backgammon rules" because I can't quite get the hang of that game. Before that, "What awards did Spy Kids win?"
BuzzFeed: Ooh, what prompted that?
Brooke: I was watching Spy Kids, and I said, "Tell me this won an Oscar!" and it did not.
Connor: Mine is: "Elizabeth Olsen," "Can you get a small microwave?" "Mormon underwear..." I don't know why I searched that.
Brooke: Do they have different underwear?
Connor: Yeah, they have to wear different underwear. Also, "Can you use an inhaler if you don't have asthma?" I was really out of breath in Colorado, and I was, like, I don't know if this would help me. But yeah, the underwear; it's a full-body set.
8. How does your friendship impact your ability to work together? What are some of the challenges you face as friends who are also colleagues?
Brooke: It makes it really good. Period. But, also it can be hard because if you disagree with each other, as business partners, that's normal. But, on a friend level, it's hard not to take it a little bit more personally. For me, that's the only real hardship, though. Otherwise, it's a dream.
Connor: I think you nailed it. It's more good than it is tumultuous.
9. Which fictional character is your co-host most similar to?
Connor: Brooke, you're like Edna Mode because you need glasses and you're tiny. And you would hit me with a newspaper, if given the chance.
Brooke: Maybe Nick from New Girl.
Connor: That's a compliment. Brooke got me to watch New Girl, so I wouldn't have even known that until last year.
Brooke: Nick and Edna make a podcast.
10. What’s the most misunderstood thing about you or your co-host?
Connor: I think the most misunderstood thing about us is that we're not fighting. Everyone's like, "I'm so on Connor's side," or, "I'm so on Brooke's side," but it's actually like, we stop recording and we're like, "What are you gonna eat for lunch?" All of these opinions we have — it's banter, it's entertainment for the podcast. Once the recording stops, it's like our laptop's shut. We're not at each other's throats as soon as we hang up the pod.
Brooke: I think we disagree on the podcast more than we would in real life because if you just agree with each other, it's not fun. [On the podcast] we don't let anything slip through the cracks. We just jump on each other when given the opportunity.
11. Brooke, what’s something Connor does better than any other person you’ve ever met? Connor, what’s something Brooke does better than any other person you’ve ever met?
Brooke: Socialize. It really is an art form to watch him meet new people. He always knows just what to say and acts like he's known whoever he's meeting for 20 years.
Connor: Brooke is good at faking it. Brooke will be in the worst mood ever, or if we're working on something else and it's miserable, Brooke can hold it together for, genuinely, two hours, and it's like you would never even know.
Brooke: I'm shocked to hear that.
Connor: Like, I know [when Brooke's miserable] because I know Brooke, and it makes me laugh, but if you were a third party, you'd be like, "Oh, she's loving it right now. She wouldn't rather be anywhere else."
Brooke: That's so interesting.
12. Who is your dream podcast guest (real or fictional)? What would you want to talk to them about?
Brooke: I think Hank Green because we talk about science a lot in a way that would require his presence. We're, like, spewing misinformation, and I think it would be really helpful to have someone on-site fact-checking.
Connor: I'd like to have Kristen Wiig on because I feel like she is never fully out of character, and she's so interesting and has so many stories to tell. I feel like we haven't heard her story yet. That would be a good wealth of knowledge. SNL afterparty stories, and stuff. I would like to pick her brain. I feel like she'd be really funny. And, Julia Louis-Dreyfus would be up there for sure. Her podcast is so good. It's always interesting to see a comedic actor do something that's a little more serious.
13. If you could do a crossover episode with any other podcast (outside of the TMG Studios universe), which show would you choose, and why?
Brooke: The Basement Yard. They crack my corn.
Connor: Yeah, we would have such good banter, too.
14. What’s the most surprising challenge you face in work or in regular life as an internet personality?
Brooke: The biggest challenge, for me, is when I'm in a bad mood. I feel like I'm in a bad mood pretty often, and it's really hard to do podcasting and be a personality when you don't want to have a personality. But, that's also something to work on! God gives her toughest battles to her strongest warriors.
Connor: I think the biggest challenge for us is getting people different places. Our videos started under the TMG network on YouTube, and now we're getting people to go over to our new channel. We're seeing challenges with moving people, but they are moving in a big way. There's that thing of needing to establish our own space.
Brooke: Are you plugging the new space right now?
Connor: I'm plugging the new space! We have our own YouTube channel now. We're still with TMG Studios and were so blessed to have a Kickstarter with Cody and Noel, but we made the decision to move over and build, build, build. So, now we're calling people over to Brooke and Connor Make A Podcast to broadcast our own channel. It's been massive, honestly, growth-wise, but we gotta keep pushing, pushing, pushing it.
15. What have been your key takeaways from being podcasters? What have you learned? Would you go back and do anything differently?
Brooke: I've learned that there is gonna be at least one person who doesn't like what you have to say, and if I could go back in time, I would tell myself that, and not to stress about it. Because that's gonna happen no matter what, whether you stress about it or not, so just don't stress about it.
Connor: I've learned to stop apologizing before I say stuff for the same reason, or to stop over-explaining things. People know your heart, I guess. Also, I've learned to stop reading comments completely.
16. What’s the most difficult part of having a creative job?
Connor: Immediate gratification and immediate disappointment.
Brooke: Also, not being able to turn your creativity on.
Connor: Or off.
Brooke: I don't have that issue.
Connor: I mean, there's no 9 to 5 with what we do. If you're out on a Saturday or if you're on vacation and the opportunity presents itself...it's just a trade-off, which is fine. But, a lot of times, it's like I'm thinking in TikTok. Sometimes, I'll go on a family vacation and be like, "I actually finished everything in advance, we recorded in advance, and got all this stuff done." And then I'm like, "Oh, this would be a good TikTok," and I'm out at dinner with my family. I gotta pull my phone out and write this down. It's the nature of the game. Honestly, it's a great problem to have, but it's different. Can't complain about having ideas though. There are other times when I actually can't think of anything.
17. What work are you excited about beyond Brooke and Connor Make A Podcast? What are other projects you're able to discuss?
Connor: I'm touring soon! The Fibs & Friends Tour is hitting 12 cities, and I think we're up to about 35 completely sold-out shows across the US, so I'm really stoked for that!
Brooke: I am coming out with a solo venture podcast called Obsessed, and it's coming out January 26th. It's gonna be a deep-dive into some of the things I'm obsessed with and some of the things my friends are obsessed with, and it'll kind of be a space to be an obsessive personality and not like things in normal amounts.
18. Do you have any advice for people who want to get into podcasting or building an internet platform?
Brooke: I think what works for us is having the same conversations on-camera as you would off-camera. Not turning on a specific podcast voice or topic, just being yourself, but in front of a camera.
Connor: You know what I would say, that we didn't do? I really don't know how to replicate what we did. I think it's literally divine intervention. But, I would say, find a niche. Find your thing. I think we found our thing in not finding our thing. I was always thinking, "What's our podcast about? Is it about this or that?" Ours, luckily, didn't have to fit into anything. We always say, "Don't put us in a room." Our podcast is not in a box. If you were starting from scratch right now, which I don't know if I could ever do, I would tell other people to find their niche and find their thing. Find your voice, and keep posting over and over and over and over again. And then quit your job.
19. What are you manifesting for 2024?
Brooke: I'm manifesting a shift. In the universe.
Connor: You need to be more specific because it could be a shift in a bad way.
Brooke: I'm manifesting a shift in the universe that will benefit me positively.
Connor: I'm gonna snowball off of that. I'm also manifesting a shift in the universe that will benefit me positively. Health is a good one. I want to get healthier. And then I want a massive amount of success to come from this stand-up tour. Genuinely. The success of this tour so far is unsubstantiated; it's not based in fact. The massive amount of success that I've gotten from the tour isn't based on anything yet. No one knows what my stand-up looks like. They're just trusting that it's good, and so I want to manifest substantiated success, meaning I worked really hard and I earned that success. I want credibility, but I want it to be because I worked really hard.
20. What do you hope listeners take away from your podcast?
Brooke: Don't be afraid to sound dumb. The smartest people are not afraid to sound dumb.
Connor: There are no dumb questions.
Brooke: It's not dumb because dumb questions get you to the answers. There are dumb questions, but don't be afraid to ask them.
Connor: Somebody has to ask them! You know the funniest story? I was in class one day and I asked a question, and my professor, after I asked the question, said, "Hey, just a reminder to everybody that there are no dumb questions." But it was after I'd asked a question. That's staying with me for my entire life.
