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Rachel Sennott enters the video call and at once starts an apology. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she states, sounding genuinely regretful. Despite being only a couple of minutes delayed, she needs to justify. “I tend to talk too much during calls. I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Fortunately, for a writer, that’s just what one hopes to experience. Besides, it’s fairly unsurprising. Viewers who have seen the unapologetically LGBTQ+ and outspoken film Bottoms—which Sennott collaborated on with the director and featured in alongside her friend The Bear’s standout—can understand that Sennott possesses a lot to share, ranging from about identity, relationships, or the merits of creating a high-school brawl society. Plus, after watching the latest seasonal show I Love LA, it becomes obvious that she holds further perspectives on the challenges of modern youth (At 30, she represents an honorary member of the gang, a tale-end millennial skilled for straddling different age groups).

Inspirations and Artistic Direction

Parallels to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show naturally arise and the actress admits to being enthusiastic, citing it together with the HBO hit, Issa Rae’s show and Donald Glover’s series as inspirations for the project, which follows the journey of online personality played by Odessa A’Zion and ally who is also new talent manager Sennott’s character. However, the biggest spot on the moodboard belonged to Entourage, that program depicting a rising A-list actor making his way in a corrupt LA scene (notable statement: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). Sennott started watching it throughout COVID-19, became “obsessed”, and resolved to add a fresh perspective 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 says. The idea for this project emerged—partly—from her own, initially fractious, move to Tinseltown and from her cosmic event, a popular event for enthusiasts. It was a time that saw her understand some big truths, in her career and individually. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she admits. “After relocating to Los Angeles in my mid-twenties, I found stability, only for things to crumble. It was almost like these biblical tests …”

Humble Origins

Raised in New England, the star commenced creating and acting comedy while pursuing acting 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 states. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” “Theatre productions at school also didn’t accept me. “I wondered why I was even there at all.”

Sennott took matters into her own hands, appearing at open mics with her friend and uploading hilarious (and decidedly) unconventional skits digitally. One, Baby Cult, followed a group of women intensely fixated on pregnancy; a different one envisioned working at a trendy retail outlet as akin to being caught in a scary movie. Interestingly, she met Emma through campus film circles and eventually featuring in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, a stressful film set at a Jewish wake with echoes of Uncut Gems. The central motif of her path, she says, has been people her own age supporting her, as opposed to established gatekeepers. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “Not the gatekeepers”, she repeats, continuing humorously: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”

Manifesting Dreams

Those who had doubts regarding Sennott then will likely be kicking themselves now. As part of she describes as a “incredibly circular” story, she has achieved an ideal role. Previously she shared content called on LA life on the internet, in which she parodied film promos (“I’m addicted to drugs – we all are”). Now, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a show about Angelenos juggling advantages of internet fame (such as socializing at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your client being suspected of being a intoxicated criminal, and potentially becoming a unreliable pariah). One might simple to create a show about online fame that was extremely idealized—or, even less favorable, one that mocked at those depicted. This show does neither, creating a depiction of privileged twentysomething existence that’s frank about the chaos and the glamour.

Nuanced Portrayal

“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