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Rachel Sennott joins the video call and at once begins an excuse. “Apologies for the delay!” she says, sounding truly apologetic. Although she's only slightly delayed, she wants to justify. “My phone conversations always run long.” I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Luckily, for a writer, that’s just what one hopes to encounter. Additionally, it’s pretty predictable. Anyone who know the fearlessly queer and brash film Bottoms—that Sennott penned with her creative partner and featured in with her friend Ayo Edebiri—would be aware that she has much to share, be it about identity, sex, or the pros of forming a youth brawl society. Furthermore, after watching her recent seasonal program I Love LA, it is clear that the star has additional insights about the darker side of Gen Z life (At 30, Sennott represents a relatable figure of the gang, straddling eras skilled for connecting different age groups).

Guiding Lights and Storytelling Approach

Parallels to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and the actress admits to being a fan, naming the show alongside the HBO hit, Issa Rae’s show and Atlanta as inspirations for her series, which tracks the struggles of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and close companion and aspiring agent Maia. However, the most significant influence on creative vision belonged to the HBO series, that program focusing on an emerging A-list actor succeeding in a gritty Hollywood (notable statement: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). Sennott began viewing it during lockdown, became “captivated”, and chose to create a new version 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 idea for the series emerged—partly—from her own, originally rocky, relocation to Los Angeles and from her cosmic event, a popular occurrence for followers. This represented an era that included her grasp significant insights, professionally and in private life. “My twenties began with constant public emotional outbursts and disorganization,” she recalls. “After relocating to Los Angeles in my mid-twenties, I found stability, only for things to crumble. “It resembled a series of extreme challenges…”

Starting Out

Brought up in the East Coast, Sennott began developing and showcasing humor while enrolled in performance at a prestigious arts school. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she states. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” “Theatre productions at school also didn’t accept me. And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”

Sennott decided to act independently, appearing at amateur nights with Edebiri and uploading uproarious (and distinctly) weird skits on the internet. One, titled Baby Cult, followed several females obsessively fixated on motherhood; a different one portrayed being employed at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being trapped in a horror film. Interestingly, she met Seligman through campus film circles and ended up appearing in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, an anxious comedy set at a Jewish wake with echoes of the Safdie brothers’ movie. A recurring idea of her path, she explains, has been people her own age giving her a shot, instead of the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “Definitely not them”, she confirms, stating humorously: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”

Career Breakthrough

Anyone who had doubts regarding Sennott then will likely be feeling foolish now. In what she calls a “astonishingly complete” turn of events, she seems to have created her dream vehicle. Previously she shared a video called about Los Angeles on the internet, in which she lampooned Hollywood trailers (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Now, she’s executive producer (with the co-writer) of a show about Angelenos managing the perks of internet fame (such as socializing at a famous actor’s house) with drawbacks (your friend being accused of being a drug-addled thief, and potentially becoming a risky pariah). Some could easy to create a program about digital influence that was horribly aspirational—or, even less favorable, one that punched down at those depicted. I Love LA avoids both, resulting in a depiction of privileged twentysomething life that’s honest about the grot and the shine.

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 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