The performer joins the online meeting and at once launches into an excuse. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she exclaims, seeming genuinely apologetic. Although she's only a couple of minutes delayed, 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, during an interview, this is just what you want to hear. Besides, it’s fairly predictable. Viewers familiar with her unapologetically openly gay and unapologetically crass project titled Bottoms—that Sennott co-wrote with Emma Seligman and starred in together with close companion the talented actress—would be aware that Sennott holds a lot to share, be it about roles, sex, or the pros of creating a teen combat group. Plus, after watching her recent eight-part show titled I Love LA, it is clear that the star carries even more insights about the struggles of modern youth (As a millennial, Sennott serves as an honorary member for this generation, straddling eras adept for connecting millennials and Gen Z).
Influences and Storytelling Approach
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show are inevitable and the actress admits to being enthusiastic, naming the show in addition to the HBO hit, the acclaimed comedy and the innovative program as influences for her series, which follows the travails of online personality Tallulah and close companion who is also aspiring representative Maia. Notably, the most significant influence on creative vision went to the popular sitcom, the program about an emerging Hollywood star making his way in a corrupt Hollywood (choice quote: “only the unsuccessful find joy here”). Sennott discovered it throughout lockdown, became “captivated”, 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 says. The concept for I Love LA came—to some extent—from her own, initially rocky, move to LA and from her cosmic event, a popular occurrence for followers. That period marked a time that involved her learn major life lessons, work-wise and individually. “In my early 20s I was so messy, crying in public everywhere, all the time,” she says. “Settling in LA during my mid-twenties brought calm, but soon everything unraveled.” It was almost like these biblical tests …”
Starting Out
Brought up in the East Coast, Sennott started writing and performing humor while studying performance at a prestigious arts school. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she explains. “I tried out for all the NYU comedy groups, and got rejected from all of them. I tried out for all the NYU plays and didn’t make it into any of them. “It left me questioning my purpose and place.”
Sennott took matters into her own hands, performing at live shows with her friend and sharing hysterical (and very) weird skits digitally. One, Baby Cult, followed a group of women intensely fixated on motherhood; another envisioned being employed at the preppy clothing store Hollister as akin to being stuck in a horror film. Interestingly, she met Emma through campus film circles and eventually featuring in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, a stressful film set at a Jewish wake with echoes of Uncut Gems. The central motif of her journey, she notes, has been contemporaries offering opportunities, rather than the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “Not the gatekeepers”, she emphasizes, stating amusedly: “They don’t want us to win.”
Rising Success
Anyone who were skeptical about her then will certainly be kicking themselves currently. Through she calls a “incredibly circular” development, she seems to have created an ideal role. In 2019 she uploaded a clip called about Los Angeles online, in which she parodied Hollywood trailers (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Years later, she’s executive producer (with her partner) of a series about Angelenos managing benefits of online celebrity (such as partying at a famous actor’s house) with its pitfalls (your client being accused of being a substance-abusing thief, and perhaps becoming a risky outcast). It would be tempting to produce a show about digital influence that was extremely aspirational—or, worse, one that belittled at the characters. I Love LA avoids both, creating a depiction of advantaged millennial living that’s frank about the grot and the shine.
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 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
