The performer joins the video call and right away launches into an apology. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she says, sounding genuinely apologetic. Despite being only a bit behind, she feels compelled to justify. “My phone conversations always run long.” “Earlier calls made me late—I just can’t stop chatting!” Luckily, during an interview, that’s just what one hopes to hear. Additionally, it’s fairly unsurprising. Viewers familiar with her unapologetically openly gay and outspoken project titled Bottoms—which Sennott collaborated on with Emma Seligman and starred in with her friend Ayo Edebiri—will be aware that she possesses much to say, whether on gender, intimacy, or the pros of forming a high-school brawl society. Furthermore, by the end the new eight-part HBO series titled I Love LA, viewers realize that the star has additional thoughts about the darker side of young adulthood (As a millennial, Sennott serves as a relatable figure of the gang, on the cusp with a knack for straddling both generations).
Influences and Artistic Direction
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s Girls are inevitable and Sennott readily acknowledges an admirer, citing the show in addition to the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and Donald Glover’s series as influences for the project, which follows the journey of online personality Tallulah and close companion and new agent Sennott’s character. However, the biggest spot on the moodboard went to Entourage, that HBO sitcom about a rising celebrity making his way in a corrupt entertainment industry (notable statement: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). She started watching it amid COVID-19, became “hooked”, and resolved to put her own twist on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.
“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 came—partly—from firsthand, at first rocky, transition to Tinseltown and from the cosmic event, a frequently discussed occurrence for enthusiasts. It was a time that involved her learn major life lessons, work-wise and in private life. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” 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 resembled a series of extreme challenges…”
Early Beginnings
Raised in Connecticut, Sennott started writing and performing comedy while enrolled in theatre at NYU’s Tisch. “I went through all the proper channels to try to perform, and they weren’t gelling,” she states. “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?”
Sennott took matters into her own hands, appearing at open mics with her friend and posting hysterical (and distinctly) unconventional skits digitally. One, titled Baby Cult, centered on characters fetishistically obsessed with motherhood; a different one imagined working at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being stuck in a thriller. In a neat twist of fate, she encountered Seligman through campus film circles and ended up starring in her first film, titled Shiva Baby, a stressful film set at a funeral gathering with hints of the intense thriller. The big theme of her path, she says, has been contemporaries offering opportunities, as opposed to established gatekeepers. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “Definitely not them”, she emphasizes, stating humorously: “They don’t want us to win.”
Rising Success
Individuals who were skeptical about her then will certainly be feeling foolish today. In what she describes as a “wild, full-circle” story, she seems to have achieved the perfect project. A few years back she uploaded a video called about Los Angeles on social media, in which she parodied Hollywood trailers (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a series about LA residents balancing advantages of online celebrity (such as celebrating at Elijah Wood’s house) with drawbacks (your client being accused of being a drug-addled thief, and perhaps becoming a “brand unsafe” persona non grata). Some could tempting to produce a series about digital influence that was horribly aspirational—or, worse, one that mocked at those depicted. This show steers clear of each, creating a depiction of privileged twentysomething existence that’s honest about the mess and the glamour.
Balanced Perspective
“Numerous series present younger generations and digital culture in a derogatory manner,” 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
