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Rachel Sennott joins the video call and right away launches into an apology. “Apologies for the delay!” she states, sounding genuinely regretful. Despite being only slightly behind, she needs to explain. “I tend to talk too much during calls. I had two calls before this, and I’m like, I’ve gotta stop talking!” Thankfully, during an interview, that’s precisely what one hopes to experience. Additionally, it’s pretty predictable. Those who know the boldly LGBTQ+ and unapologetically crass project titled Bottoms—that she penned with the director and starred in alongside collaborator The Bear’s standout—will already know that she holds much to discuss, whether about identity, intimacy, or the appeal of creating a high-school brawl society. And, once you finish her latest eight-part HBO series titled I Love LA, it is clear that she has even more insights regarding the challenges of Gen Z life (Now in her thirties, she serves as a bridge to younger audiences, a tale-end millennial with a knack for straddling millennials and Gen Z).

Influences and Creative Vision

Parallels to the iconic series Girls can’t be avoided and the actress admits to being an admirer, referencing the show in addition to Sex and the City, Insecure and the innovative program as influences for her series, which follows the journey of an influencer Tallulah and ally who is also fledgling talent manager portrayed by Sennott. Perhaps, the biggest spot on concept went to Entourage, the show depicting an up-and-coming A-list actor succeeding in an often-seedy entertainment industry (notable statement: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). She discovered it throughout COVID-19, became “obsessed”, 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 notes. The concept for this project originated—in part—from her own, at first difficult, relocation to Tinseltown and from her astrological phase, a much-talked-about event for enthusiasts. This represented a phase that involved her understand some big 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. “The struggles felt almost mythic in scale…”

Humble Origins

Brought up in New England, Sennott commenced creating and acting humor while enrolled in performance at NYU’s Tisch. “Despite trying every conventional route, I couldn’t find my footing,” she states. “Auditions for university comedy troupes led to universal rejection. “None of the university plays cast me either.” And I just felt like, what am I doing here?”

She decided to act independently, taking the stage at amateur nights with Edebiri and posting hysterical (and very) unconventional comedy videos digitally. One, titled Baby Cult, depicted characters fetishistically obsessed with having babies; a different one envisioned being employed at the brand Hollister as akin to being trapped in a horror film. Interestingly, she connected with Seligman through NYU’s movie community and eventually starring in her initial project, titled Shiva Baby, a tense film set at a funeral gathering with shades of the Safdie brothers’ movie. The big theme of her path, she says, has been contemporaries giving her a shot, as opposed to traditional networks. Does that mean bypassing the usual powers? “They were not involved”, she confirms, stating with a laugh: “They don’t want us to win.”

Career Breakthrough

Individuals who had doubts about her then will certainly be regretting it today. In what she labels a “astonishingly complete” turn of events, she has created an ideal role. A few years back she shared content named about Los Angeles online, in which she lampooned Hollywood trailers (“Everyone’s hooked on something”). Years later, she’s the co-showrunner (with the co-writer) of a show about LA residents balancing advantages of digital stardom (such as celebrating at a celebrity’s house) with downsides (your associate being labeled as being a drug-addled criminal, and perhaps becoming a risky persona non grata). One might simple to make a program about digital influence that was horribly idealized—or, more problematic, one that punched down at those depicted. The series does neither, making for a depiction of advantaged twentysomething living that’s candid about the chaos and the appeal.

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 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