Rachel Sennott exploring her hilarious series about that chaotic allure of today's youth life
The star joins the video call and right away starts an explanation. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she exclaims, appearing truly remorseful. Despite being only a bit late, she needs to clarify. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. “Earlier calls made me late—I just can’t stop chatting!” Thankfully, during an interview, that’s precisely what you want to experience. Besides, it’s quite unsurprising. Viewers familiar with her fearlessly openly gay and outspoken project Bottoms—that she collaborated on with her creative partner and starred in alongside close companion Ayo Edebiri—would understand that Sennott has plenty to discuss, whether about identity, relationships, or the pros of forming a youth brawl society. Plus, after watching her latest seasonal program titled I Love LA, it is clear that she holds even more thoughts regarding the challenges of modern youth (At 30, she represents a relatable figure of the gang, a tale-end millennial adept for straddling different age groups).
Influences and Creative Vision
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s Girls are inevitable and the actress admits to being an admirer, citing the show alongside the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and Atlanta as inspirations for the project, which follows the travails of online personality Tallulah and ally and aspiring representative Sennott’s character. Notably, the biggest influence on creative vision belonged to the popular sitcom, the show focusing on a rising Hollywood star succeeding in an often-seedy entertainment industry (choice quote: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). Sennott started watching it during lockdown, became “obsessed”, and decided 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 explains. The inspiration for the series came—in part—from her own, at first rocky, transition to Tinseltown and from the cosmic event, a frequently discussed phenomenon for enthusiasts. That period marked a phase that saw her grasp significant 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 resembled a series of extreme challenges…”
Humble Origins
Brought up in the East Coast, the star commenced developing and showcasing humor while studying performance at NYU’s Tisch. “I went through all the proper channels to try to perform, and they weren’t gelling,” she says. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” 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 seized control, appearing at live shows with her friend and posting hilarious (and very) bizarre comedy videos on the internet. One, Baby Cult, followed several females intensely drawn to motherhood; a different one imagined working at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being trapped in a thriller. By chance, she met Emma through campus film circles and ended up starring in her first film, Shiva Baby, a stressful dramedy set at a Jewish wake with shades of the intense thriller. A recurring idea of her path, she says, has been peers supporting her, as opposed to the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “Definitely not them”, she confirms, stating humorously: “Our victory isn’t their goal.”
Manifesting Dreams
Anyone who questioned about Sennott earlier will surely be regretting it today. In what she calls a “wild, full-circle” turn of events, she seems to have created the perfect project. Previously she uploaded content named about Los Angeles on social media, in which she mocked film promos (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Now, she’s a lead creator (with the co-writer) of a comedy about Angelenos balancing benefits of internet fame (such as partying at a celebrity’s house) with its pitfalls (your client being suspected of being a substance-abusing stealer, and possibly becoming a “brand unsafe” pariah). Some could easy to create a show about online fame that was horribly aspirational—or, more problematic, one that belittled at its subjects. This show steers clear of each, making for a depiction of advantaged young adult living that’s candid about the mess and the glamour.
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