The star enters the video call and right away launches into an excuse. “Apologies for the delay!” she says, seeming truly remorseful. Although she's only slightly behind, 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!” Thankfully, in this context, that’s precisely what you want to hear. Moreover, it’s fairly unsurprising. Those who have seen the boldly openly gay and unapologetically crass project Bottoms—that Sennott co-wrote with her creative partner and featured in alongside her friend the talented actress—can be aware that she has plenty to share, ranging from about identity, sex, or the pros of forming a youth fight club. Furthermore, by the end her recent multi-episode show I Love LA, viewers realize that she has even more insights regarding the struggles of young adulthood (Now in her thirties, Sennott serves as a bridge of the gang, straddling eras skilled for bridging different age groups).
Guiding Lights and Creative Vision
Likenesses to the iconic series Girls naturally arise and the actress is an admirer, citing the show together with the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and Atlanta as inspirations for I Love LA, which tracks the travails of online personality played by Odessa A’Zion and ally and aspiring talent manager Sennott’s character. Notably, the largest influence on the moodboard was reserved for Entourage, that program about an up-and-coming A-list actor making his way in a corrupt Hollywood (memorable line: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). She began viewing it during lockdown, became “obsessed”, and resolved to add a fresh perspective on it “for the girls and the gays”.
“My aim was to focus on digital fame over traditional entertainment, as my own beginnings were on the web,” she notes. The inspiration for I Love LA came—partly—from personal, originally rocky, relocation to LA and from the saturn return, a popular phenomenon for enthusiasts. It was a phase that involved her grasp major life lessons, professionally and individually. “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. “The struggles felt almost mythic in scale…”
Early Beginnings
Brought up in New England, the star commenced developing and showcasing comedy while enrolled in performance at a prestigious arts school. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she states. “Auditions for university comedy troupes led to universal rejection. “Theatre productions at school also didn’t accept me. “I wondered why I was even there at all.”
Sennott seized control, performing at live shows with Edebiri and uploading hysterical (and decidedly) weird comedy videos digitally. A particular video, Baby Cult, centered on several females fetishistically obsessed with pregnancy; a different one portrayed being employed at the brand Hollister as akin to being trapped in a horror film. Interestingly, she encountered Emma through the university’s film scene and ended up starring in her first film, Shiva Baby, a tense dramedy set at a religious event with hints of the intense thriller. A recurring idea of her journey, she explains, has been contemporaries offering opportunities, instead of the industry at large. So the old guard wasn’t helpful? “They were not involved”, she emphasizes, continuing humorously: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Manifesting Dreams
Individuals who had doubts about her previously will surely be kicking themselves currently. In what she labels a “astonishingly complete” story, she has achieved the perfect project. In 2019 she shared a video titled “it’s LA” online, in which she mocked Hollywood trailers (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s a lead creator (with Emma Barrie) of a series about LA residents juggling the perks of internet fame (such as socializing at a celebrity’s house) with drawbacks (your client being labeled as being a substance-abusing stealer, and potentially becoming a “brand unsafe” persona non grata). One might simple to create a show about online fame that was horribly aspirational—or, even less favorable, one that mocked at those depicted. I Love LA steers clear of each, resulting in a portrait of privileged twentysomething existence that’s candid about the grot 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
