The performer enters the digital interview and immediately starts an excuse. “Apologies for the delay!” she states, appearing really remorseful. Although she's only slightly late, she needs to justify. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. “Previous discussions went over, and I realized I talk too much!” Fortunately, in this context, this is precisely what one hopes to hear. Moreover, it’s quite expected. Viewers who have seen her boldly queer and outspoken movie Bottoms—which she penned with the director and starred in alongside her friend the talented actress—would be aware that Sennott has a lot to discuss, be it about gender, intimacy, or the appeal of forming a teen combat group. Furthermore, after watching her recent multi-episode show I Love LA, it becomes obvious that she has even more perspectives on the darker side of Gen Z life (At 30, Sennott is a bridge for this generation, a tale-end millennial with a knack for straddling both generations).
Inspirations and Artistic Direction
The comparisons to Lena Dunham’s Girls are inevitable and Sennott is an admirer, referencing it in addition to Sex and the City, the acclaimed comedy and Atlanta as guides for I Love LA, which tracks the journey of a social media star played by Odessa A’Zion and close companion who is also new representative Sennott’s character. Notably, the largest spot on creative vision was reserved for the popular sitcom, that program focusing on an emerging A-list actor making his way in a corrupt LA scene (choice quote: “nobody’s happy in this town except for the losers”). She discovered it amid the pandemic, became “hooked”, and decided to put her own twist on it “targeting women and LGBTQ+ viewers”.
“I sought to highlight online platforms as the new industry, since my professional journey launched there,” she says. The inspiration for I Love LA emerged—in part—from her own, at first fractious, relocation to Los Angeles and from the saturn return, a frequently discussed event for followers. This represented an era that involved her grasp significant truths, work-wise and personally. “In my early 20s I was so messy, crying in public everywhere, all the time,” 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…”
Starting Out
Brought up in Connecticut, Sennott started creating and acting comedy while pursuing acting at New York University (NYU) Tisch School of the Arts. “I went through all the proper channels to try to perform, and they weren’t gelling,” she explains. “I tried out for all the NYU comedy groups, and got rejected from all of them. “None of the university plays cast me either.” “It left me questioning my purpose and place.”
She decided to act independently, taking the stage at open mics with her friend and sharing uproarious (and distinctly) bizarre comedy videos on the internet. A particular video, titled Baby Cult, centered on characters fetishistically obsessed with having babies; a different one portrayed working at the preppy clothing store Hollister as similar to being stuck in a horror film. By chance, she connected with Seligman through the university’s film scene and ended up appearing in her initial project, Shiva Baby, a stressful dramedy set at a religious event with echoes of the intense thriller. The big theme of her journey, she notes, has been peers supporting her, as opposed to traditional networks. So the old guard wasn’t helpful? “They were not involved”, she confirms, stating humorously: “They don’t want us to win.”
Manifesting Dreams
Individuals who were skeptical about Sennott then will surely be feeling foolish today. In what she describes as a “astonishingly complete” turn of events, she appears to manifested her dream vehicle. In 2019 she uploaded a video called about Los Angeles on social media, in which she mocked film promos (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s a lead creator (with Emma Barrie) of a comedy about LA residents managing benefits of online celebrity (such as partying at Elijah Wood’s house) with downsides (your client being accused of being a substance-abusing thief, and possibly becoming a “brand unsafe” persona non grata). One might tempting to create a program about digital influence that was extremely aspirational—or, more problematic, one that belittled at the characters. I Love LA avoids both, making for a depiction of affluent millennial life that’s honest about the chaos and the appeal.
Empathetic Approach
“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
