Rachel Sennott enters the video call and right away starts an excuse. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she states, sounding genuinely apologetic. She is only slightly behind, she needs to explain. “My phone conversations always run long.” “Previous discussions went over, and I realized I talk too much!” Luckily, in this context, this is precisely what you want to experience. Additionally, it’s fairly predictable. Viewers who have seen the fearlessly LGBTQ+ and brash movie Bottoms—which Sennott co-wrote with the director and starred in with close companion the talented actress—would understand that Sennott holds plenty to say, ranging from on identity, relationships, or the appeal of forming a teen brawl society. Plus, once you finish the recent seasonal HBO series I Love LA, it is clear that she carries additional perspectives regarding the darker side of modern youth (Now in her thirties, she represents a relatable figure of the gang, on the cusp with a knack for bridging different age groups).
Guiding Lights and Storytelling Approach
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show are inevitable and Sennott admits to being enthusiastic, citing the show together with the HBO hit, the acclaimed comedy and Donald Glover’s series as guides for I Love LA, which follows the travails of online personality Tallulah and her friend and aspiring representative portrayed by Sennott. However, the most significant presence on concept went to the popular sitcom, that HBO sitcom about an up-and-coming Hollywood star making his way in a corrupt entertainment industry (memorable line: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). She started watching it amid COVID-19, became “captivated”, and chose to add a fresh perspective on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.
“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 came—to some extent—from her own, initially fractious, relocation to Tinseltown and from her cosmic event, a frequently discussed phenomenon for enthusiasts. This represented a phase that saw her grasp some big truths, professionally and in private life. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she recalls. “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
Brought up in the East Coast, Sennott commenced developing and showcasing humor 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 explains. “I tried out for all the NYU comedy groups, and got rejected from all of them. “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 live shows with her friend and uploading uproarious (and decidedly) bizarre comedy videos digitally. One, Baby Cult, followed a group of women obsessively drawn to having babies; a different one portrayed being employed at the brand Hollister as akin to being stuck in a horror film. In a neat twist of fate, she encountered Seligman through campus film circles and eventually featuring in her first film, titled Shiva Baby, a tense film set at a funeral gathering with hints of the Safdie brothers’ movie. The big theme of her path, she notes, has been people her own age giving her a shot, instead of the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “They were not involved”, she emphasizes, continuing humorously: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Rising Success
Those who questioned regarding her earlier will surely be kicking themselves today. In what she describes as a “astonishingly complete” story, she has manifested an ideal role. In 2019 she shared content called on LA life on the internet, in which she mocked movie previews (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Now, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a comedy about Angelenos managing advantages of online celebrity (such as celebrating at Elijah Wood’s house) with downsides (your client being labeled as being a intoxicated stealer, and perhaps becoming a “brand unsafe” persona non grata). It would be simple to produce a program about online fame that was overly aspirational—or, worse, one that punched down at those depicted. I Love LA steers clear of each, making for a representation of affluent millennial living that’s frank about the chaos 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
