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Rachel Sennott joins the digital interview and right away begins an explanation. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she says, seeming truly regretful. Although she's only slightly behind, she feels compelled 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!” Fortunately, in this context, this is precisely what you want to hear. Besides, it’s quite predictable. Anyone familiar with her fearlessly queer and unapologetically crass project Bottoms—which she collaborated on with Emma Seligman and featured in together with her friend The Bear’s standout—can already know that Sennott holds plenty to say, be it on gender, relationships, or the merits of forming a high-school combat group. And, once you finish her recent eight-part HBO series I Love LA, it is clear that she has even more insights about the challenges of Gen Z life (Now in her thirties, she represents a relatable figure to younger audiences, a tale-end millennial adept for bridging both generations).

Influences and Artistic Direction

The comparisons to Lena Dunham’s Girls are inevitable and the actress is a fan, citing the show together with the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and Donald Glover’s series as inspirations for her series, which follows the struggles of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and close companion who is also new talent manager Sennott’s character. However, the most significant presence on creative vision was reserved for the HBO series, the program about a rising celebrity succeeding in a corrupt LA scene (notable statement: “only the unsuccessful find joy here”). She started watching it during the pandemic, became “captivated”, and decided to put her own twist on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.

“I sought to highlight online platforms as the new industry, since my professional journey launched there,” she notes. The concept for this project emerged—partly—from firsthand, at first difficult, move to LA and from her saturn return, a popular event for enthusiasts. This represented an era that saw her learn major insights, in her career and personally. “My twenties began with constant public emotional outbursts and disorganization,” she admits. “Settling in LA during my mid-twenties brought calm, but soon everything unraveled.” “The struggles felt almost mythic in scale…”

Humble Origins

Raised in New England, Sennott started writing and performing comedy while pursuing acting at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “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. 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 live shows with her friend and posting uproarious (and decidedly) unconventional comedy videos on the internet. One, Baby Cult, centered on several females obsessively fixated on having babies; another envisioned being employed at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being caught in a scary movie. In a neat twist of fate, she met Seligman through campus film circles and ended up appearing in her first film, titled Shiva Baby, a tense film set at a religious event with echoes of Uncut Gems. A recurring idea of her career, she explains, has been people her own age supporting her, instead of established gatekeepers. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “They were not involved”, she confirms, adding humorously: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”

Career Breakthrough

Those who had doubts about her earlier will certainly be feeling foolish now. Through she calls a “wild, full-circle” turn of events, she appears to manifested the perfect project. A few years back she uploaded content titled “it’s LA” online, in which she lampooned film promos (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Now, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a comedy about city dwellers balancing the perks of digital stardom (such as socializing at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your client being suspected of being a intoxicated criminal, and perhaps becoming a risky pariah). One might tempting to produce a show about internet celebrity that was overly glamorous—or, more problematic, one that belittled at its subjects. This show avoids both, resulting in a depiction of advantaged young adult existence that’s candid about the mess and the appeal.

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 comments. “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