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Rachel Sennott appears on the digital interview and right away starts an explanation. “Apologies for the delay!” she says, seeming genuinely remorseful. Although she's only a bit behind, she needs to clarify. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. “Previous discussions went over, and I realized I talk too much!” Luckily, for a writer, that’s exactly what one hopes to encounter. Additionally, it’s pretty predictable. Those who know her fearlessly queer and unapologetically crass film Bottoms—which she penned with her creative partner and featured in alongside collaborator Ayo Edebiri—will be aware that Sennott possesses a lot to share, be it on identity, relationships, or the appeal of forming a teen fight club. Plus, once you finish the recent multi-episode show I Love LA, viewers realize that the star has further perspectives on the challenges of modern youth (As a millennial, she is a bridge of the gang, a tale-end millennial adept for straddling millennials and Gen Z).

Influences and Artistic Direction

Parallels to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show naturally arise and the actress readily acknowledges an admirer, naming it in addition to Sex and the City, Insecure and the innovative program as influences for I Love LA, which details the travails of online personality played by Odessa A’Zion and her friend and new representative Sennott’s character. However, the most significant influence on concept was reserved for the HBO series, that HBO sitcom about an up-and-coming A-list actor making his way in an often-seedy entertainment industry (memorable line: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). Sennott began viewing it during the pandemic, became “obsessed”, and chose to put her own twist on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.

“My aim was to focus on digital fame over traditional entertainment, as my own beginnings were on the web,” she says. The concept for I Love LA came—in part—from her own, originally difficult, move to LA and from her cosmic event, a frequently discussed event for enthusiasts. It was a phase that involved her learn significant life lessons, 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. “The struggles felt almost mythic in scale…”

Starting Out

Raised in Connecticut, Sennott began creating and acting humor while pursuing performance at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she states. “Auditions for university comedy troupes led to universal rejection. I tried out for all the NYU plays and didn’t make it into any of them. “I wondered why I was even there at all.”

Sennott seized control, performing at amateur nights with Ayo and posting uproarious (and decidedly) bizarre skits digitally. One, Baby Cult, depicted characters obsessively drawn to pregnancy; a different one envisioned working at a trendy retail outlet as like being stuck in a thriller. In a neat twist of fate, she connected with Emma through NYU’s movie community and ultimately appearing in her first film, titled Shiva Baby, an anxious comedy set at a religious event with echoes of the Safdie brothers’ movie. A recurring idea of her journey, she explains, has been peers giving her a shot, as opposed to the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “They were not involved”, she emphasizes, continuing amusedly: “They don’t want us to win.”

Rising Success

Individuals who had doubts regarding Sennott previously will surely be feeling foolish currently. In what she describes as a “astonishingly complete” story, she seems to have created the perfect project. A few years back she uploaded content named about Los Angeles on social media, in which she parodied film promos (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Now, she’s a lead creator (with the co-writer) of a comedy about city dwellers juggling benefits of digital stardom (such as partying at a celebrity’s house) with drawbacks (your friend being suspected of being a drug-addled stealer, and potentially becoming a “brand unsafe” persona non grata). One might tempting to create a show about digital influence that was overly idealized—or, more problematic, one that punched down at the characters. The series steers clear of each, creating a portrait of privileged millennial living that’s candid about the grot and the shine.

Empathetic Approach

“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