A comical video on Instagram made Fleur Overgaag (32) famous in one fell swoop. Since then she has a large fan base and posts funny sketches about everyday things every week. Now there is also a podcast series.
A funny video on Instagram about how a mother used to address her children to a mother now, suddenly earned Fleur Overgaag (32) a trio of followers who she now entertains every week with comical sketches about everyday things. And her theme of nostalgia provides plenty of discussion material, for example for a podcast series .
Had told Fleur Overgaag a year ago that she would now no longer be able to cross the street without being recognized and she would have laughed at you. At the time, she was working in the bakery in Amsterdam that she owns with her boyfriend. But on May 8, she started her own challenge : she came up with a funny sketch every day, made a video of it and put it online to see what she could achieve with it.
‘I was at Q-music!’
“It felt very vulnerable to post a video every day for just a few followers, there were really just over twenty, into which I put my whole heart and soul. If it is not yet successful, it is a bit sad to put everything you have online. But I had planned to last three months. If it didn’t work out, I would have at least tried my best.”
Her number of followers exploded after she posted the video in which she supposedly addresses children in the backseat of the car: one moment as a down-to-earth, somewhat strict mother from ‘the past’ and then as a pampering curling parent of today, who is concerned that the children ( Stella Coco and Peony) are overstimulated or have had too much sugar.
“I had about 100 followers at that time and my video suddenly went viral with a million views. I was heard on Q-music. It was a very bizarre sensation! Then I was recognized on the street and I really thought: huh… how?”
‘It was magical’
Fleur, who attended the Film Actors Academy acting course in Amsterdam and then had difficulty finding work as an actress, was suddenly approached by agencies asking if she wanted to work together. “Everyone wanted something from me, the world had really turned around. It was magical that I was suddenly allowed to choose instead of having to peddle myself.”
Since then she has made countless videos in which she plays different characters, such as lifestyle coach Irene. But it is mainly her sketches about motherhood that made her famous. And even though she is not a mother herself. “Everyone has a mother, knows a mother or sees a mother in the supermarket. I am inspired by what I see and I magnify that.”
She doesn’t do that to make fun of people, she says. “I don’t necessarily think much of today’s mothers either. I think we all do our best and at the end of the day hope we did a good job. If I were a mother, I think I would be kind of in the middle. On the one hand I would also be a bit overly concerned and on the other hand I could also be very strict.”
‘I now dare to be ‘ugly”
In order to play the characters in her videos on Instagram and TikTok, Fleur had to cross a threshold. ‘I now dare to be ‘ugly’ and I am no longer concerned with looking fat or having wrinkles in my videos. When I was a bit younger, I found it more difficult to put that embarrassment aside and focus on the end result of the video.”
Fleur is regularly overloaded with reactions and they are almost always positive. “What I like most is the messages from people who recognize themselves in my videos and find it very embarrassing. They feel a bit caught.”
Because the subject of nostalgia is catching on, Fleur has created a 6-part podcast series about it. Past Versus Now , which can now be heard. “I think nostalgia is something very interesting when we look at how we deal with it. So I thought doing a podcast about this would be really fantastic. It is a subject where there is a lot to be learned, about which people think and reminisce: what was that like for me?” And with a big smile: “And I love talking and people, so that works out well for a podcast.”
Was the past better?
She will talk to singer Shary-An, actor Joes Brauers, Sanne Akkerman from the Instagram account, among others. La VieSanne and ‘Real Gooische Mother’ Pauline Wingelaar. The conversations are about food, growing up and raising children. At the end of each podcast she asks her guest whether the past was better than now.
What is her own answer to that question? “I think so, but mainly because of the nostalgia. A layer of warmth and beauty comes around things because they are in the past. And I think that’s why it feels like everything was better before.”