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The performer enters the video call and right away starts an excuse. “Apologies for the delay!” she exclaims, appearing really apologetic. She is only slightly late, she wants to justify. “My phone conversations always run long.” “Previous discussions went over, and I realized I talk too much!” Luckily, in this context, this is precisely what is ideal to experience. Moreover, it’s quite predictable. Those who know the boldly LGBTQ+ and unapologetically crass film Bottoms—that she collaborated on with the director and featured in with collaborator Ayo Edebiri—can already know that she possesses a lot to say, ranging from about gender, sex, or the appeal of starting a youth fight club. And, once you finish the recent seasonal program titled I Love LA, it becomes obvious that she holds additional insights regarding the darker side of young adulthood (At 30, she serves as a relatable figure to younger audiences, on the cusp adept for connecting millennials and Gen Z).

Guiding Lights and Storytelling Approach

Likenesses to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and Sennott readily acknowledges an admirer, citing the show in addition to the classic series, the acclaimed comedy and Atlanta as inspirations for I Love LA, which tracks the struggles of an influencer Tallulah and her friend who is also fledgling talent manager Sennott’s character. Notably, the biggest influence on creative vision went to Entourage, that show about an up-and-coming Hollywood star succeeding in a corrupt Hollywood (notable statement: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). Sennott started watching it during the pandemic, became “hooked”, and chose to create a new version on it “with female and queer audiences in mind”.

“I wanted to make a show where the internet, not Hollywood, was the industry, because my career started online,” she says. The concept for I Love LA emerged—in part—from personal, initially fractious, move to Tinseltown and from her saturn return, a popular phenomenon for enthusiasts. That period marked an era that involved her understand some big insights, in her career and individually. “During my younger years, I was chaotic, often breaking down in public,” she admits. “Settling in LA during my mid-twenties brought calm, but soon everything unraveled.” “It resembled a series of extreme challenges…”

Starting Out

Raised in New England, Sennott started creating and acting stand-up while studying performance at a prestigious arts school. “I went through all the proper channels to try to perform, and they weren’t gelling,” she says. “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. And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”

Sennott decided to act independently, taking the stage at amateur nights with Ayo and posting hysterical (and very) unconventional online content on the internet. A particular video, Baby Cult, centered on characters intensely fixated on motherhood; another imagined working at a trendy retail outlet as similar to being caught in a thriller. Interestingly, she encountered Emma through the university’s film scene and ended up appearing in her initial project, Shiva Baby, a tense dramedy set at a religious event with shades of the intense thriller. A recurring idea of her path, she explains, has been people her own age offering opportunities, instead of established gatekeepers. So, not the gatekeepers, then? “They were not involved”, she emphasizes, stating with a laugh: “They prefer we don’t succeed.”

Rising Success

Anyone who had doubts about Sennott earlier will likely be regretting it now. Through she describes as a “incredibly circular” development, she appears to achieved the perfect project. Previously she posted content called on LA life online, in which she mocked film promos (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Years later, she’s a lead creator (with Emma Barrie) of a series about Angelenos balancing the perks of internet fame (such as partying at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your friend being labeled as being a drug-addled criminal, and perhaps becoming a “brand unsafe” pariah). It would be tempting to create a show about internet celebrity that was overly glamorous—or, worse, one that punched down at those depicted. I Love LA steers clear of each, resulting in a portrait of advantaged twentysomething life that’s frank about the mess and the appeal.

Nuanced Portrayal

“Many programs portray youth and online life with disdain and mockery,” 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