Rachel Sennott appears on the video call and at once starts an explanation. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she says, sounding truly remorseful. She is only slightly behind, she needs to clarify. “My phone conversations always run long.” I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Luckily, in this context, that’s precisely what you want to encounter. Additionally, it’s fairly predictable. Anyone who know the boldly queer and outspoken project Bottoms—which she co-wrote with the director and featured in together with collaborator The Bear’s standout—will already know that she has plenty to discuss, ranging from about roles, relationships, or the pros of starting a teen combat group. Furthermore, once you finish the latest seasonal program I Love LA, it becomes obvious that the star carries even more insights regarding the darker side of young adulthood (At 30, she represents a relatable figure for this generation, a tale-end millennial with a knack for straddling different age groups).
Influences and Artistic Direction
Parallels to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show can’t be avoided and the actress is an admirer, citing the show alongside the HBO hit, the acclaimed comedy and the innovative program as guides for the project, which follows the struggles of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and close companion and aspiring agent portrayed by Sennott. Notably, the biggest spot on creative vision went to Entourage, the show about a rising celebrity navigating in a corrupt Hollywood (memorable line: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). She discovered it throughout COVID-19, became “obsessed”, and decided to create a new version on it “for the girls and the gays”.
“My aim was to focus on digital fame over traditional entertainment, as my own beginnings were on the web,” she notes. The idea for this project emerged—partly—from her own, at first rocky, transition to Los Angeles and from the saturn return, a frequently discussed phenomenon for astrology heads. This represented an era that included her understand some big 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 was almost like these biblical tests …”
Early Beginnings
Brought up in the East Coast, Sennott commenced creating and acting comedy while studying performance at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she states. “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. “It left me questioning my purpose and place.”
She took matters into her own hands, performing at amateur nights with Edebiri and uploading uproarious (and distinctly) bizarre comedy videos digitally. One, Baby Cult, followed characters obsessively fixated on motherhood; another imagined being employed at the preppy clothing store Hollister as akin to being caught in a thriller. By chance, she connected with Emma through NYU’s movie community and eventually appearing in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, a stressful film set at a religious event with echoes of the Safdie brothers’ movie. A recurring idea of her career, she notes, has been people her own age offering opportunities, as opposed to traditional networks. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “Not the gatekeepers”, she repeats, stating with a laugh: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”
Rising Success
Those who had doubts about her earlier will surely be feeling foolish today. As part of she calls a “wild, full-circle” turn of events, she has achieved an ideal role. Previously she shared a video titled on LA life online, in which she mocked Hollywood trailers (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s a lead creator (with the co-writer) of a comedy about LA residents managing advantages of online celebrity (such as socializing at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your associate being suspected of being a substance-abusing stealer, and possibly becoming a “brand unsafe” persona non grata). Some could easy to make a series about online fame that was extremely aspirational—or, even less favorable, one that belittled at its subjects. This show does neither, creating a portrait of privileged young adult existence that’s honest about the mess and the glamour.
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 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
