Rachel Sennott appears on the online meeting and right away starts an explanation. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she exclaims, sounding really remorseful. She is only slightly delayed, she feels compelled to clarify. “My phone conversations always run long.” I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Thankfully, for a writer, this is precisely what is ideal to experience. Additionally, it’s quite predictable. Viewers who know the unapologetically openly gay and brash film titled Bottoms—that she penned with Emma Seligman and starred in with her friend The Bear’s standout—can already know that she has plenty to share, ranging from about roles, sex, or the merits of creating a high-school combat group. Furthermore, by the end the latest seasonal program titled I Love LA, viewers realize that she holds further perspectives about the challenges of Gen Z life (As a millennial, she is a bridge of the gang, straddling eras adept for connecting millennials and Gen Z).
Inspirations and Creative Vision
Likenesses to Lena Dunham’s Girls are inevitable and the actress readily acknowledges enthusiastic, citing it together with the HBO hit, Insecure and Donald Glover’s series as influences for the project, which follows the journey of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and her friend who is also fledgling agent Sennott’s character. Perhaps, the largest presence on the moodboard went to Entourage, that HBO sitcom about an up-and-coming Hollywood star navigating in an often-seedy LA scene (choice quote: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). Sennott started watching it throughout lockdown, became “hooked”, and resolved to put her own twist on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.
“I sought to highlight online platforms as the new industry, since my professional journey launched there,” she explains. The inspiration for this project originated—to some extent—from personal, initially rocky, transition to Los Angeles and from the saturn return, a frequently discussed occurrence for astrology heads. It was a time that saw her understand major life lessons, work-wise and in private life. “My twenties began with constant public emotional outbursts and disorganization,” she says. “In my mid-20s, I moved to LA and got settled. And then I felt like everything started to just fall apart. It was almost like these biblical tests …”
Early Beginnings
Brought up in Connecticut, the star commenced creating and acting comedy while studying theatre at NYU’s Tisch. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she explains. “Auditions for university comedy troupes led to universal rejection. 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 Edebiri and posting hysterical (and distinctly) weird comedy videos digitally. One, Baby Cult, centered on several females fetishistically fixated on pregnancy; another envisioned being employed at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being caught in a thriller. By chance, she connected with Seligman through NYU’s movie community and eventually featuring in her first film, Shiva Baby, a stressful comedy set at a funeral gathering with shades of the Safdie brothers’ movie. A recurring idea of her journey, she explains, has been peers offering opportunities, instead of traditional networks. So the old guard wasn’t helpful? “Not the gatekeepers”, she emphasizes, adding with a laugh: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”
Rising Success
Anyone who had doubts about Sennott then will likely be feeling foolish now. In what she calls a “incredibly circular” development, she seems to have created her dream vehicle. A few years back she uploaded a clip named on LA life online, in which she lampooned film promos (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Years later, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a comedy about city dwellers juggling benefits of online celebrity (such as socializing at a celebrity’s house) with downsides (your friend being labeled as being a drug-addled stealer, and perhaps becoming a unreliable outcast). Some could tempting to create a series about digital influence that was overly glamorous—or, even less favorable, one that punched down at its subjects. This show does neither, making for a representation of privileged twentysomething living that’s candid about the mess and the glamour.
Balanced Perspective
“Numerous series present younger generations and digital culture in a derogatory manner,” 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
