Rachel Sennott enters the digital interview and at once starts an explanation. “Apologies for the delay!” she states, appearing genuinely regretful. She is only slightly behind, she wants to justify. “My phone conversations always run long.” I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Luckily, in this context, this is precisely what you want to encounter. Moreover, it’s pretty unsurprising. Those who know the unapologetically queer and outspoken project titled Bottoms—which she penned with the director and appeared in together with collaborator the talented actress—will already know that she possesses much to say, whether on gender, sex, or the appeal of forming a teen fight club. Plus, by the end the new eight-part HBO series I Love LA, it is clear that she has even more perspectives about the challenges of modern youth (Now in her thirties, she represents a relatable figure to younger audiences, on the cusp skilled for bridging different age groups).
Guiding Lights and Creative Vision
The comparisons to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and Sennott readily acknowledges an admirer, citing the show alongside the classic series, Issa Rae’s show and Donald Glover’s series as inspirations for her series, which details the travails of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and her friend and aspiring representative Maia. However, the biggest spot on the moodboard was reserved for the popular sitcom, that HBO sitcom about an up-and-coming celebrity succeeding in an often-seedy Hollywood (notable statement: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). She began viewing it amid lockdown, became “obsessed”, and resolved to put her own twist on it “for the girls and the gays”.
“I wanted to make a show where the internet, not Hollywood, was the industry, because my career started online,” she notes. The inspiration for the series originated—to some extent—from her own, originally rocky, move to Los Angeles and from the cosmic event, a popular event for astrology heads. It was a phase that involved her learn some big life lessons, work-wise and personally. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she admits. “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
Brought up in Connecticut, Sennott began writing and performing stand-up while enrolled in performance at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “I went through all the proper channels to try to perform, and they weren’t gelling,” she says. “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.”
She took matters into her own hands, performing at live shows with Ayo and posting hysterical (and decidedly) bizarre online content on the internet. A particular video, Baby Cult, centered on several females obsessively obsessed with having babies; a different one imagined working at a trendy retail outlet as akin to being stuck in a thriller. By chance, she met Emma through the university’s film scene and eventually starring in her first film, Shiva Baby, a tense dramedy set at a religious event with echoes of the Safdie brothers’ movie. The big theme of her journey, she notes, has been people her own age supporting her, as opposed to the industry at large. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “They were not involved”, she repeats, continuing humorously: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Manifesting Dreams
Anyone who were skeptical regarding her earlier will likely be kicking themselves currently. In what she calls a “astonishingly complete” development, she appears to achieved an ideal role. In 2019 she uploaded a video named on LA life online, in which she lampooned Hollywood trailers (“I’m addicted to drugs – we all are”). Years later, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a series about city dwellers managing advantages of digital stardom (such as partying at a celebrity’s house) with downsides (your client being suspected of being a drug-addled stealer, and perhaps becoming a unreliable persona non grata). It would be tempting to make a show about internet celebrity that was overly aspirational—or, more problematic, one that punched down at its subjects. This show avoids both, making for a representation of advantaged twentysomething existence that’s honest about the mess and the glamour.
Balanced Perspective
“Many programs portray youth and online life with disdain and mockery,” 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
