The star joins the video call and right away launches into an excuse. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she says, sounding truly apologetic. Although she's only a bit behind, she feels compelled to explain. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. “Previous discussions went over, and I realized I talk too much!” Thankfully, during an interview, that’s precisely what you want to hear. Besides, it’s quite unsurprising. Viewers familiar with her unapologetically LGBTQ+ and outspoken project Bottoms—which Sennott co-wrote with her creative partner and featured in with her friend Ayo Edebiri—can be aware that she holds plenty to share, whether on identity, relationships, or the merits of creating a youth fight club. Furthermore, by the end her new seasonal HBO series titled I Love LA, it is clear that the star carries even more insights regarding the struggles of young adulthood (At 30, Sennott is a relatable figure to younger audiences, on the cusp with a knack for bridging millennials and Gen Z).
Influences and Creative Vision
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and Sennott admits to being enthusiastic, citing it together with the classic series, Insecure and the innovative program as inspirations for her series, which follows the struggles of an influencer played by Odessa A’Zion and her friend and fledgling talent manager Sennott’s character. However, the largest influence on creative vision went to the HBO series, the HBO sitcom focusing on a rising Hollywood star succeeding in an often-seedy entertainment industry (notable statement: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). Sennott discovered it throughout COVID-19, became “captivated”, and chose to put her own twist 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 concept for the series emerged—to some extent—from personal, at first difficult, move to LA and from the cosmic event, a much-talked-about phenomenon for astrology heads. This represented a phase that saw her understand significant insights, in her career and personally. “My twenties began with constant public emotional outbursts and disorganization,” she recalls. “In my mid-20s, I moved to LA and got settled. And then I felt like everything started to just fall apart. “The struggles felt almost mythic in scale…”
Humble Origins
Raised in the East Coast, the star began developing and showcasing comedy while pursuing performance at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she explains. “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?”
She decided to act independently, taking the stage at amateur nights with Ayo and uploading uproarious (and decidedly) unconventional comedy videos online. A particular video, Baby Cult, depicted characters intensely drawn to motherhood; another envisioned being employed at the brand Hollister as similar to being caught in a scary movie. Interestingly, she met Emma through campus film circles and eventually featuring in her first film, titled Shiva Baby, a tense comedy set at a Jewish wake with shades of the intense thriller. The central motif of her career, she says, has been peers giving her a shot, rather than traditional networks. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “Not the gatekeepers”, she repeats, adding with a laugh: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Rising Success
Individuals who were skeptical about her earlier will likely be kicking themselves currently. In what she describes as a “astonishingly complete” turn of events, she appears to created the perfect project. A few years back she shared content called “it’s LA” on the internet, in which she parodied movie previews (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Now, she’s executive producer (with Emma Barrie) of a comedy about city dwellers juggling advantages of internet fame (such as partying at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your associate being suspected of being a substance-abusing stealer, and perhaps becoming a risky persona non grata). Some could simple to create a program about internet celebrity that was horribly idealized—or, more problematic, one that mocked at its subjects. The series steers clear of each, making for a representation of affluent young adult life that’s honest about the grot and the glamour.
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 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
