The performer joins the digital interview and right away begins an explanation. “Apologies for the delay!” she states, seeming really regretful. Despite being only a bit delayed, she feels compelled to explain. “My phone conversations always run long.” “Earlier calls made me late—I just can’t stop chatting!” Luckily, during an interview, this is exactly what you want to encounter. Besides, it’s pretty expected. Those who have seen her boldly openly gay and unapologetically crass film Bottoms—that Sennott penned with her creative partner and starred in with collaborator The Bear’s standout—will understand that Sennott holds a lot to share, ranging from on identity, relationships, or the pros of forming a youth combat group. And, once you finish the new eight-part show I Love LA, it becomes obvious that the star holds even more thoughts regarding the darker side of modern youth (At 30, Sennott is a relatable figure to younger audiences, on the cusp with a knack for straddling both generations).
Guiding Lights and Storytelling Approach
Parallels to the iconic series Girls can’t be avoided and the actress admits to being enthusiastic, citing the show together with the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and Atlanta as inspirations for her series, which details the travails of an influencer played by Odessa A’Zion and ally and new talent manager Maia. Notably, the largest presence on the moodboard went to the HBO series, that program focusing on a rising Hollywood star succeeding in an often-seedy Hollywood (choice quote: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). Sennott discovered it during the pandemic, became “obsessed”, and resolved to put her own twist on it “for the girls and the gays”.
“I wanted to make a show where the internet, not Hollywood, was the industry, because my career started online,” she explains. The inspiration for I Love LA emerged—partly—from personal, initially fractious, relocation to Los Angeles and from her saturn return, a popular occurrence for followers. This represented an era that included her understand some big truths, work-wise and personally. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she admits. “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
Growing up in the East Coast, Sennott began creating and acting humor while pursuing theatre at NYU’s Tisch. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she says. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” I tried out for all the NYU plays and didn’t make it into any of them. And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”
Sennott decided to act independently, performing at amateur nights with her friend and posting hilarious (and distinctly) weird online content on the internet. One, Baby Cult, centered on several females intensely drawn to motherhood; another envisioned being employed at the brand Hollister as similar to being stuck in a thriller. In a neat twist of fate, she connected with Emma through NYU’s movie community and ultimately starring in her initial project, Shiva Baby, a stressful dramedy set at a religious event with hints of the Safdie brothers’ movie. A recurring idea of her journey, she says, has been people her own age giving her a shot, instead of traditional networks. So the old guard wasn’t helpful? “Not the gatekeepers”, she repeats, stating humorously: “They don’t want us to win.”
Rising Success
Individuals who were skeptical about Sennott previously will likely be regretting it currently. Through she calls a “wild, full-circle” story, she appears to created her dream vehicle. Previously she shared a clip named “it’s LA” on social media, in which she lampooned film promos (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s the co-showrunner (with Emma Barrie) of a show about LA residents juggling the perks of internet fame (such as celebrating at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your client being suspected of being a substance-abusing stealer, and potentially becoming a unreliable pariah). One might simple to create a series about online fame that was extremely aspirational—or, even less favorable, one that punched down at its subjects. I Love LA does neither, making for a representation of affluent twentysomething living that’s candid about the chaos 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 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
