The performer joins the digital interview and right away launches into an explanation. “I can’t believe I’m late!” she says, sounding truly apologetic. Despite being only slightly behind, she feels compelled to justify. “I have such a problem, because I’m a yapper on the phone. I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Luckily, for a writer, this is exactly what is ideal to experience. Additionally, it’s fairly unsurprising. Anyone who have seen her fearlessly openly gay and brash film titled Bottoms—which Sennott co-wrote with Emma Seligman and appeared in alongside her friend Ayo Edebiri—can already know that Sennott has plenty to say, be it on gender, sex, or the pros of creating a youth fight club. Plus, once you finish her latest multi-episode HBO series I Love LA, it is clear that the star has even more perspectives regarding the challenges of modern youth (Now in her thirties, she represents a relatable figure for this generation, straddling eras with a knack for connecting both generations).
Guiding Lights and Storytelling Approach
Likenesses to Lena Dunham’s Girls can’t be avoided and the actress admits to being a fan, naming it together with the HBO hit, the acclaimed comedy and the innovative program as guides for the project, which follows the struggles of online personality played by Odessa A’Zion and her friend and fledgling talent manager Sennott’s character. However, the biggest spot on the moodboard was reserved for the popular sitcom, that show focusing on an up-and-coming A-list actor making his way in a gritty Hollywood (memorable line: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). Sennott began viewing it during lockdown, became “hooked”, and resolved to create a new version on it “targeting women and LGBTQ+ viewers”.
“I sought to highlight online platforms as the new industry, since my professional journey launched there,” she notes. The concept for the series originated—in part—from her own, at first difficult, relocation to Tinseltown and from the saturn return, a popular occurrence for astrology heads. That period marked a time that saw her understand significant insights, work-wise and personally. “In my early 20s I was so messy, crying in public everywhere, all the time,” she recalls. “After relocating to Los Angeles in my mid-twenties, I found stability, only for things to crumble. “It resembled a series of extreme challenges…”
Early Beginnings
Brought up in the East Coast, the star started writing and performing humor while pursuing acting at NYU’s Tisch. “I followed traditional paths to get on stage, but nothing clicked,” she explains. “Auditions for university comedy troupes led to universal rejection. “Theatre productions at school also didn’t accept me. And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”
She decided to act independently, appearing at open mics with Ayo and posting hysterical (and distinctly) unconventional online content digitally. One, titled Baby Cult, depicted a group of women fetishistically obsessed with having babies; another portrayed being employed at the preppy clothing store Hollister as similar to being stuck in a scary movie. By chance, she connected with Seligman through the university’s film scene and ultimately featuring in her initial project, Shiva Baby, a stressful film set at a Jewish wake with hints of the intense thriller. The central motif of her path, she notes, has been contemporaries giving her a shot, instead of the industry at large. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “Not the gatekeepers”, she emphasizes, continuing amusedly: “They don’t want us to win.”
Career Breakthrough
Those who had doubts regarding her earlier will surely be regretting it today. As part of she calls a “incredibly circular” story, she appears to achieved the perfect project. In 2019 she posted content called about Los Angeles on social media, in which she mocked film promos (“I’m addicted to drugs – we all are”). Six years on, she’s the co-showrunner (with Emma Barrie) of a show about city dwellers managing advantages of digital stardom (such as socializing at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your friend being suspected of being a drug-addled stealer, and possibly becoming a unreliable pariah). One might easy to create a series about online fame that was overly aspirational—or, worse, one that mocked at those depicted. The series avoids both, creating a portrait of privileged young adult life that’s honest about the mess and the glamour.
Nuanced Portrayal
“Numerous series present younger generations and digital culture in a derogatory manner,” 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
