The actress and writer discussing her hilarious comedy depicting that messy glamour of younger generation life
Rachel Sennott appears on the online meeting and right away launches into an apology. “Apologies for the delay!” she says, seeming really apologetic. Despite being 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 just what you want to experience. Additionally, it’s fairly predictable. Those familiar with the boldly queer and outspoken movie Bottoms—that Sennott co-wrote with the director and featured in with collaborator Ayo Edebiri—can be aware that she holds much to say, be it on identity, sex, or the merits of creating a youth combat group. Plus, after watching the recent eight-part HBO series titled I Love LA, it becomes obvious that the star holds additional perspectives about the challenges of modern youth (As a millennial, Sennott is a bridge to younger audiences, a tale-end millennial adept for connecting different age groups).
Inspirations and Artistic Direction
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and Sennott admits to being an admirer, referencing the show together with the classic series, Issa Rae’s show and the innovative program as inspirations for her series, which details the travails of an influencer played by Odessa A’Zion and close companion who is also aspiring talent manager portrayed by Sennott. Notably, the most significant spot on the moodboard went to the popular sitcom, the show depicting an emerging celebrity navigating in a corrupt Hollywood (memorable line: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). She discovered it during lockdown, became “hooked”, and decided to create a new version on it “targeting women and LGBTQ+ viewers”.
“I wanted to make a show where the internet, not Hollywood, was the industry, because my career started online,” she notes. The inspiration for I Love LA came—in part—from her own, at first rocky, relocation to LA and from the cosmic event, a frequently discussed occurrence for astrology heads. This represented a phase that involved her understand some big truths, in her career and personally. “In my early 20s I was so messy, crying in public everywhere, all the time,” she says. “Settling in LA during my mid-twenties brought calm, but soon everything unraveled.” It was almost like these biblical tests …”
Starting Out
Raised in the East Coast, the star started creating and acting comedy while enrolled in theatre at NYU’s Tisch. “I went through all the proper channels to try to perform, and they weren’t gelling,” she explains. “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. “It left me questioning my purpose and place.”
She decided to act independently, taking the stage at amateur nights with Ayo and posting hilarious (and decidedly) bizarre comedy videos online. One, Baby Cult, followed several females intensely fixated on having babies; another imagined being employed at the brand Hollister as like being caught in a scary movie. Interestingly, she encountered Seligman through campus film circles and ultimately appearing in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, an anxious film set at a funeral gathering with echoes of the Safdie brothers’ movie. A recurring idea of her career, she says, has been contemporaries supporting her, instead of the industry at large. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “Definitely not them”, she repeats, continuing humorously: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”
Manifesting Dreams
Individuals who questioned about Sennott earlier will likely be feeling foolish today. As part of she calls a “incredibly circular” development, she seems to have created an ideal role. In 2019 she shared content named about Los Angeles on the internet, in which she lampooned Hollywood trailers (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Years later, she’s a lead creator (with her partner) of a series about city dwellers balancing advantages of digital stardom (such as partying at Elijah Wood’s house) with drawbacks (your associate being suspected of being a intoxicated stealer, and potentially becoming a unreliable outcast). One might easy to make a program about online fame that was horribly aspirational—or, worse, one that mocked at those depicted. This show does neither, resulting in a portrait of affluent young adult living that’s candid about the mess and the glamour.
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 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
