The performer appears on the online meeting and at once begins an excuse. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she exclaims, appearing really apologetic. Despite being only slightly delayed, she wants to clarify. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Fortunately, for a writer, this is exactly what is ideal to experience. Besides, it’s quite predictable. Anyone familiar with the fearlessly LGBTQ+ and outspoken film titled Bottoms—that she collaborated on with the director and featured in together with her friend Ayo Edebiri—will already know that Sennott has plenty to share, be it on roles, sex, or the merits of forming a high-school fight club. And, once you finish her new eight-part show titled I Love LA, it becomes obvious that the star carries further perspectives about the struggles of young adulthood (Now in her thirties, she is a bridge to younger audiences, straddling eras skilled for connecting millennials and Gen Z).
Guiding Lights and Storytelling Approach
The comparisons to Lena Dunham’s Girls naturally arise and the actress readily acknowledges a fan, citing it alongside the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and the innovative program as inspirations for her series, which tracks the struggles of an influencer played by Odessa A’Zion and ally who is also fledgling agent portrayed by Sennott. Notably, the biggest spot on the moodboard belonged to Entourage, that HBO sitcom about an emerging Hollywood star navigating in a gritty entertainment industry (choice quote: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). She started watching it throughout COVID-19, became “obsessed”, and decided to create a new version on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.
“I wanted to make a show where the internet, not Hollywood, was the industry, because my career started online,” she explains. The inspiration for this project came—in part—from firsthand, at first fractious, transition to Los Angeles and from the saturn return, a popular event for followers. That period marked a phase that included her understand some big truths, work-wise and in private life. “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.” “It resembled a series of extreme challenges…”
Humble Origins
Raised in the East Coast, Sennott began writing and performing stand-up while enrolled in performance at NYU’s Tisch. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she says. “Auditions for university comedy troupes led to universal rejection. “None of the university plays cast me either.” And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”
Sennott decided to act independently, performing at amateur nights with Edebiri and sharing hilarious (and very) unconventional comedy videos online. A particular video, Baby Cult, depicted several females fetishistically obsessed with having babies; a different one envisioned being employed at a trendy retail outlet as akin to being caught in a thriller. In a neat twist of fate, she met Emma through campus film circles and ultimately starring in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, a tense dramedy set at a Jewish wake with echoes of Uncut Gems. A recurring idea of her journey, she explains, has been people her own age supporting her, as opposed to the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “They were not involved”, she repeats, continuing amusedly: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Career Breakthrough
Individuals who had doubts regarding her then will surely be feeling foolish currently. In what she labels a “incredibly circular” story, she has manifested her dream vehicle. In 2019 she posted content called on LA life on the internet, in which she lampooned film promos (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Years later, she’s a lead creator (with Emma Barrie) of a series about city dwellers balancing the perks of digital stardom (such as celebrating at a famous actor’s house) with its pitfalls (your client being labeled as being a drug-addled stealer, and potentially becoming a unreliable outcast). One might simple to produce a series about digital influence that was horribly aspirational—or, even less favorable, one that punched down at those depicted. This show avoids both, resulting in a representation of advantaged young adult life that’s frank about the grot and the shine.
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 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
