Rachel Sennott joins the online meeting and immediately launches into an apology. “Apologies for the delay!” she says, seeming really remorseful. She is only a bit behind, she wants to explain. “My phone conversations always run long.” “Earlier calls made me late—I just can’t stop chatting!” Thankfully, for a writer, this is just what you want to hear. Besides, it’s quite expected. Viewers who know her fearlessly queer and brash film titled Bottoms—which Sennott co-wrote with Emma Seligman and starred in together with close companion the talented actress—can already know that Sennott holds much to discuss, whether about gender, intimacy, or the appeal of starting a teen combat group. Plus, once you finish the recent seasonal show I Love LA, viewers realize that she carries even more insights on the struggles of modern youth (As a millennial, Sennott represents a bridge of the gang, a tale-end millennial skilled for straddling millennials and Gen Z).
Influences and Storytelling Approach
The comparisons to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show are inevitable and Sennott is a fan, citing the show alongside the HBO hit, the acclaimed comedy and the innovative program as inspirations for I Love LA, which follows the travails of online personality played by Odessa A’Zion and her friend who is also fledgling talent manager Sennott’s character. Notably, the most significant presence on concept went to Entourage, that show depicting a rising Hollywood star navigating in an often-seedy LA scene (choice quote: “only the unsuccessful find joy here”). She started watching it throughout lockdown, became “obsessed”, and decided to add a fresh perspective on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.
“My aim was to focus on digital fame over traditional entertainment, as my own beginnings were on the web,” she says. The inspiration for the series originated—in part—from firsthand, initially difficult, transition to LA and from the saturn return, a popular event for followers. It was a time that saw her understand some big life lessons, work-wise and in private life. “My twenties began with constant public emotional outbursts and disorganization,” she recalls. “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
Growing up in New England, Sennott started writing and performing stand-up while enrolled in acting at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she explains. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” “None of the university plays cast me either.” And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”
She seized control, performing at amateur nights with her friend and posting hilarious (and decidedly) bizarre comedy videos online. A particular video, Baby Cult, depicted several females fetishistically obsessed with having babies; another imagined being employed at a trendy retail outlet as akin to being stuck in a horror film. By chance, she encountered Seligman through the university’s film scene and ultimately featuring in her initial project, Shiva Baby, a tense film set at a Jewish wake with hints of the intense thriller. The central motif of her path, she says, has been contemporaries giving her a shot, rather than established gatekeepers. So the old guard wasn’t helpful? “Not the gatekeepers”, she emphasizes, stating with a laugh: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Career Breakthrough
Anyone who had doubts regarding Sennott earlier will surely be kicking themselves today. Through she describes as a “incredibly circular” development, she seems to have created her dream vehicle. In 2019 she posted content titled about Los Angeles on social media, in which she mocked movie previews (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Now, she’s a lead creator (with her partner) of a series about LA residents managing advantages of online celebrity (such as partying at a celebrity’s house) with its pitfalls (your friend being labeled as being a intoxicated thief, and perhaps becoming a risky persona non grata). Some could easy to make a show about digital influence that was horribly aspirational—or, more problematic, one that belittled at the characters. I Love LA does neither, making for a depiction of privileged millennial life that’s frank about the chaos and the appeal.
Empathetic Approach
“Numerous series present younger generations and digital culture in a derogatory manner,” 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
