The star joins the online meeting and immediately launches into an explanation. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she states, appearing truly apologetic. Although she's only a couple of minutes late, she feels compelled to explain. “I tend to talk too much during calls. “Previous discussions went over, and I realized I talk too much!” Fortunately, in this context, this is precisely what is ideal to experience. Additionally, it’s pretty expected. Those who have seen her unapologetically openly gay and outspoken project Bottoms—which Sennott penned with Emma Seligman and featured in with her friend Ayo Edebiri—can already know that she holds a lot to say, ranging from about gender, relationships, or the appeal of creating a youth combat group. Furthermore, once you finish her latest multi-episode HBO series I Love LA, viewers realize that she carries further perspectives about the struggles of modern youth (Now in her thirties, she is a bridge for this generation, straddling eras with a knack for straddling millennials and Gen Z).
Guiding Lights and Artistic Direction
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show are inevitable and the actress readily acknowledges enthusiastic, citing the show together with the HBO hit, Issa Rae’s show and the innovative program as influences for her series, which details the travails of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and ally who is also new talent manager Maia. However, the biggest presence on the moodboard was reserved for Entourage, the show depicting an up-and-coming A-list actor navigating in an often-seedy entertainment industry (memorable line: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). She started watching it throughout COVID-19, became “captivated”, and resolved to add a fresh perspective on it “targeting women and LGBTQ+ viewers”.
“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 originated—partly—from her own, initially difficult, relocation to Tinseltown and from her astrological phase, a frequently discussed phenomenon for followers. This represented a phase that saw her grasp major insights, in her career and individually. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” 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…”
Early Beginnings
Raised in the East Coast, the star began writing and performing stand-up while enrolled in theatre at NYU’s Tisch. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she says. “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 seized control, performing at amateur nights with Edebiri and uploading hilarious (and decidedly) weird comedy videos online. A particular video, Baby Cult, centered on characters obsessively fixated on motherhood; a different one portrayed working at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being caught in a scary movie. In a neat twist of fate, she connected with Emma through campus film circles and ended up appearing in her directorial debut, titled Shiva Baby, a stressful film set at a religious event with shades of the Safdie brothers’ movie. The big theme of her journey, she notes, has been people her own age supporting her, rather than traditional networks. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “They were not involved”, she repeats, continuing humorously: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”
Rising Success
Individuals who were skeptical about Sennott then will certainly be regretting it currently. In what she calls a “wild, full-circle” development, she appears to achieved an ideal role. In 2019 she uploaded a clip named on LA life online, in which she lampooned movie previews (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a comedy about city dwellers juggling benefits of internet fame (such as partying at Elijah Wood’s house) with drawbacks (your client being suspected of being a drug-addled criminal, and potentially becoming a “brand unsafe” outcast). It would be simple to make a show about internet celebrity that was extremely idealized—or, more problematic, one that punched down at the characters. I Love LA steers clear of each, making for a depiction of privileged twentysomething existence that’s candid about the mess and the appeal.
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 comments. “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
