The star joins the digital interview and at once launches into an apology. “Oh my God – I’m sorry!” she exclaims, sounding truly apologetic. She is only slightly delayed, she feels compelled to justify. “I tend to talk too much during calls. “Earlier calls made me late—I just can’t stop chatting!” Thankfully, for a writer, this is just what you want to hear. Besides, it’s pretty predictable. Those familiar with the boldly LGBTQ+ and unapologetically crass project Bottoms—which Sennott collaborated on with Emma Seligman and featured in with close companion The Bear’s standout—can already know that Sennott holds a lot to discuss, ranging from on identity, relationships, or the appeal of creating a teen fight club. Furthermore, after watching the recent multi-episode HBO series I Love LA, it is clear that the star carries even more perspectives regarding the darker side of young adulthood (Now in her thirties, Sennott serves as an honorary member for this generation, on the cusp with a knack for bridging millennials and Gen Z).
Inspirations and Creative Vision
Likenesses to Lena Dunham’s groundbreaking show naturally arise and the actress readily acknowledges an admirer, referencing it alongside the HBO hit, Issa Rae’s show and Atlanta as influences for the project, which details the struggles of a social media star Tallulah and her friend and new representative Maia. Notably, the most significant presence on concept was reserved for Entourage, that show about an emerging celebrity succeeding in a corrupt LA scene (memorable line: “happiness eludes everyone but failures in this city”). She discovered it during the pandemic, became “obsessed”, and resolved 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 explains. The concept for this project emerged—partly—from her own, at first difficult, move to LA and from the saturn return, a much-talked-about phenomenon for enthusiasts. This represented a time that included her understand some big life lessons, work-wise and personally. “My twenties began with constant public emotional outbursts and disorganization,” she says. “Settling in LA during my mid-twenties brought calm, but soon everything unraveled.” “The struggles felt almost mythic in scale…”
Humble Origins
Raised in Connecticut, the star commenced creating and acting stand-up while enrolled in theatre 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 says. “Every campus humor group turned me down after tryouts.” “None of the university plays cast me either.” “I wondered why I was even there at all.”
Sennott seized control, appearing at live shows with Edebiri and sharing hysterical (and very) unconventional online content digitally. A particular video, titled Baby Cult, depicted a group of women fetishistically fixated on pregnancy; a different one imagined working at the preppy clothing store Hollister as like being caught in a thriller. In a neat twist of fate, she connected with Seligman through NYU’s movie community and ultimately appearing in her initial project, Shiva Baby, an anxious film set at a Jewish wake with echoes of the Safdie brothers’ movie. The central motif of her career, she says, has been peers offering opportunities, instead of established gatekeepers. So the old guard wasn’t helpful? “Not the gatekeepers”, she confirms, stating humorously: “They don’t want us to win.”
Career Breakthrough
Individuals who questioned about Sennott earlier will likely be feeling foolish today. In what she describes as a “astonishingly complete” development, she appears to created the perfect project. Previously she shared a video named “it’s LA” on social media, in which she lampooned movie previews (“Substance abuse is rampant here”). Six years on, she’s executive producer (with her partner) of a show about Angelenos balancing the perks of digital stardom (such as celebrating at Elijah Wood’s house) with its pitfalls (your friend being suspected of being a drug-addled stealer, and perhaps becoming a unreliable outcast). Some could simple to make a series about internet celebrity that was horribly idealized—or, worse, one that mocked at the characters. The series avoids both, resulting in a representation of advantaged twentysomething living that’s frank about the chaos and the glamour.
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
