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Rachel Sennott enters the video call and immediately starts an apology. “Apologies for the delay!” she exclaims, appearing genuinely remorseful. Although she's only a couple of minutes late, she wants to justify. “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, during an interview, this is precisely what you want to encounter. Additionally, it’s pretty expected. Viewers familiar with her fearlessly LGBTQ+ and brash movie titled Bottoms—which Sennott penned with the director and starred in with her friend Ayo Edebiri—can already know that she has a lot to discuss, whether on roles, sex, or the merits of forming a high-school fight club. Furthermore, after watching her recent seasonal HBO series I Love LA, it becomes obvious that she carries even more thoughts regarding the challenges of young adulthood (Now in her thirties, she serves as an honorary member to younger audiences, a tale-end millennial adept for straddling both generations).

Inspirations and Creative Vision

Parallels to Lena Dunham’s Girls naturally arise and the actress admits to being an admirer, naming the show alongside the classic series, Issa Rae’s show and Atlanta as inspirations for the project, which follows the struggles of online personality Tallulah and her friend who is also fledgling agent Sennott’s character. Perhaps, the biggest presence on concept belonged to the HBO series, the show depicting an up-and-coming A-list actor succeeding in a corrupt LA scene (notable statement: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). Sennott started watching it throughout lockdown, became “captivated”, and decided to add a fresh perspective on it “targeting women and LGBTQ+ viewers”.

“My aim was to focus on digital fame over traditional entertainment, as my own beginnings were on the web,” she notes. The idea for I Love LA emerged—partly—from her own, initially rocky, relocation to LA and from her astrological phase, a frequently discussed phenomenon for astrology heads. This represented an era that involved her learn major truths, in her career and in private life. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she says. “After relocating to Los Angeles in my mid-twenties, I found stability, only for things to crumble. “It resembled a series of extreme challenges…”

Early Beginnings

Growing up in the East Coast, the star commenced writing and performing comedy while enrolled in performance at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she explains. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” “Theatre productions at school also didn’t accept me. And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”

Sennott seized control, appearing at amateur nights with her friend and uploading hysterical (and distinctly) unconventional skits digitally. One, Baby Cult, followed a group of women fetishistically drawn to motherhood; another portrayed being employed at a trendy retail outlet as similar to being stuck in a horror film. By chance, she met Emma through campus film circles and ended up starring in her first film, Shiva Baby, a tense dramedy set at a funeral gathering with shades of the Safdie brothers’ movie. The big theme of her career, she explains, has been peers supporting her, instead of traditional networks. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “Not the gatekeepers”, she confirms, continuing humorously: “They don’t want us to win.”

Rising Success

Those who questioned about Sennott then will surely be regretting it currently. In what she describes as a “wild, full-circle” story, she has achieved the perfect project. In 2019 she uploaded a clip called “it’s LA” on social media, in which she parodied movie previews (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Six years on, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a comedy about city dwellers managing advantages of online celebrity (such as socializing at a famous actor’s house) with drawbacks (your friend being accused of being a substance-abusing thief, and potentially becoming a risky outcast). Some could simple to make a series about online fame that was horribly idealized—or, more problematic, one that punched down at its subjects. The series does neither, making for a representation of advantaged young adult existence that’s frank about the mess and the shine.

Empathetic Approach

“Numerous series present younger generations and digital culture in a derogatory manner,” she observes. “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