The actress and writer discussing the hilarious comedy about that grotty allure of today's youth existence
Rachel Sennott joins the digital interview and immediately begins an excuse. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she says, seeming genuinely apologetic. Despite being only a couple of minutes late, she wants to clarify. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Thankfully, for a writer, that’s exactly what one hopes to experience. Additionally, it’s pretty expected. Viewers familiar with her unapologetically LGBTQ+ and unapologetically crass film titled Bottoms—which she penned with the director and starred in together with close companion Ayo Edebiri—would understand that Sennott has a lot to discuss, ranging from on roles, sex, or the pros of starting a youth brawl society. And, by the end the latest eight-part program I Love LA, viewers realize that the star carries even more perspectives on the challenges of Gen Z life (Now in her thirties, she serves as a relatable figure for this generation, a tale-end millennial skilled for bridging both generations).
Inspirations and Creative Vision
The comparisons to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and the actress is enthusiastic, referencing it in addition to the classic series, Insecure and Donald Glover’s series as inspirations for I Love LA, which tracks the journey of online personality played by Odessa A’Zion and close companion who is also fledgling talent manager Maia. However, the biggest spot on creative vision was reserved for Entourage, that program about a rising Hollywood star navigating in a gritty entertainment industry (memorable line: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). She started watching it during lockdown, became “captivated”, and chose to add a fresh perspective on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.
“I wanted to make a show where the internet, not Hollywood, was the industry, because my career started online,” she notes. The idea for the series originated—to some extent—from her own, initially difficult, move to Los Angeles and from the cosmic event, a frequently discussed occurrence for followers. That period marked a phase that involved her understand major truths, in her career and in private life. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she recalls. “In my mid-20s, I moved to LA and got settled. And then I felt like everything started to just fall apart. It was almost like these biblical tests …”
Early Beginnings
Raised in the East Coast, the star started developing and showcasing stand-up while enrolled in performance at NYU’s Tisch. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she explains. “I tried out for all the NYU comedy groups, and got rejected from all of them. “None of the university plays cast me either.” “I wondered why I was even there at all.”
She seized control, performing at amateur nights with Ayo and sharing uproarious (and decidedly) unconventional online content on the internet. A particular video, Baby Cult, followed characters fetishistically obsessed with motherhood; another imagined working at the brand Hollister as similar to being stuck in a thriller. By chance, she met Seligman through campus film circles and ultimately featuring in her first film, Shiva Baby, a tense comedy set at a Jewish wake with hints of the intense thriller. The central motif of her path, she says, has been contemporaries offering opportunities, rather than the industry at large. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “They were not involved”, she repeats, adding with a laugh: “They don’t want us to win.”
Career Breakthrough
Individuals who had doubts regarding Sennott earlier will likely be regretting it now. As part of she describes as a “astonishingly complete” turn of events, she has manifested the perfect project. A few years back she posted a video titled on LA life on social media, in which she lampooned Hollywood trailers (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Years later, she’s a lead creator (with Emma Barrie) of a show about LA residents juggling advantages of digital stardom (such as socializing at a celebrity’s house) with downsides (your friend being labeled as being a substance-abusing thief, and potentially becoming a risky outcast). It would be simple to produce a show about digital influence that was overly aspirational—or, more problematic, one that belittled at the characters. This show does neither, resulting in a depiction of affluent young adult living that’s honest about the mess and the shine.
Balanced Perspective
“There have been a lot of shows that depict young people and their relationship to the internet in this very condescending, hateful way,” she says. “I think that young people have been through a lot – I’m mostly thinking of people younger than me, like my little sister, who went to college during Covid, so she had to come home, or my other sister who was doing school online.”|“The younger generation has faced significant