Rachel Sennott appears on the November 2025 Digital cover of ELLE. In an exclusive feature with ELLE Culture Writer Lauren Puckett-Pope, Sennott is interviewed by close friend and castmate Jordan Firstman to discuss their upcoming series, I LOVE LA, the HBO comedy Sennott created and stars in: “What I wanted to capture was—and we talked about this a lot—’Entourage for internet It girls.’” she says. “I think I’ve yet to see the internet captured [in TV and film] as the business that it is. It was really fun and felt refreshing to do a show in L.A. and not have it be about Hollywood. Especially because you and I both came up on the internet and started our careers on the internet and we’re still doing stuff [there]. You are directing your movie, I’m making a TV show, but the internet is in our bones, and I wanted to have it exist in the show in the way it does in real life.”
Sennott also reflects on finding her footing in L.A., her first time directing in the season finale, and unpacks how the show mirrors her real-life experiences and friendships: “The original pilot was more negative, and then in the process of making the show, I got more positive and felt better in my friendships and about myself.” she says. “There’ve been times where I’ve felt like, ‘Oh, my friends are abandoning me,’ because, also, I can be clingy to everyone. But we are so lucky to have each other, and I do genuinely feel like everyone has my back. You go through that sort of chaotic period where everyone feels a little insecure, but once you push through that you’re like, ‘Hold on, I love these b**ches and everyone has my back.’”
On sparking a friendship with Firstman following their first interaction:
RS: You and I met in New York, but I feel like we really rekindled and then locked in our friendship after a dinner in L.A.
JF: Where we forced you to s**t-talk. You were so scared of s**t-talking. Three gay guys storm into your apartment with takeout pasta and we were like, “You hate that person, right?”
RS: “Who’s your enemy?” I was like, “Um…um….” I was so nervous.
On learning to let go of what she can’t control:
JF: You’ve been a planner for most of your life. What have you learned about planning since you’ve started your career—when to plan and when not to plan?
RS: In the last year, I had to learn to let go and release a little. I’ve learned this lesson over and over, but I think I’m hopefully finally integrating it into my life, which is: my dad always taught me there’s a circle of things that you can control. Outside of that is your circle of influence. Outside of that is everything else. The things you can control are how hard you work, what attitude you bring to the day, like, “Am I going to go out tonight? Am I not?” Those are things you can control. The more you put into that circle, your circle of influence grows. Your circle of influence is things you can’t control, but you are able to influence. I cannot control how people respond to the show. I cannot control if they like me or they hate me or they call me ugly or “spiritually AI.” It’s okay. What I can control is that I put everything, all of my hard work, all of my energy into the show.
JF: I love that. The harder you work and the better the show is for you, the less these b**ches can hate.
RS: The less these b**ches can hate—and they’ll find a way.
On the challenges of adjusting to life in L.A.:
RS: My first year in L.A. was really rough. I came in 2020, during COVID, to be on a sitcom [ABC’s Call Your Mother], and I didn’t really know that it was a sitcom before I did it. I had booked the pilot pre-COVID, and then the show got picked up without a pilot in the middle of COVID. It was a great experience, and also the first job that paid me a real salary and I’m so grateful for it, but I felt like it didn’t necessarily feel true to who I was. I felt confused and really isolated. My first birthday in L.A. I spent alone, and I was like, “I have no friends. Everyone hates me,” whatever. I had a hard time having fun. I was really scared of COVID for a little…Jordan, you invited me to s**t and I was too scared to talk to anyone. Something was shut off in me. It was weird.
JF: That’s crazy to think about because, now, you’re the life of the party. You’re talking to everyone.
RS: I don’t know what it was. I actually looked back at our old messages the other day, and there’s three from you being like, “Do you want to come by my thing?” I’m like, “I really think I need to rest tonight.” Like…rest from what? You don’t even have a job! What the f**k?
On how her character, Maia, and Odessa A’zion’s character, Tallulah, in I Love LA both represent parts of herself:
RS: Then I got into a relationship and I really locked into settled mode, and I was like, I’m working and I’m sleeping and I’m not really doing anything fun. Then my Saturn return came along, and that’s where all of this inspo for the show came from. The other reason [that time period] was weird is because, when I was in my early 20s and in New York, I was so messy, and I was the life of the party. I was the mess of the party. Then I turned so serious. And I feel like my Saturn return was my old self punching me in the face and bringing me back.”
Tallulah is a representation of my old self and Maia is kind of like me in my worst control-freak era. Hopefully, now I’m an evolved version with a little bit of both. Maia and Tallulah are better together, and I’m better when I have the balance of those two. Charlie, Alani, Dylan, they all pull out different pieces of one another. I would be completely lost without my friends.
On how the friendship dynamics in I Love LA reflect her real life:
RS: The original pilot was more negative, and then in the process of making the show, I got more positive and felt better in my friendships and about myself. There’ve been times where I’ve felt like, “Oh, my friends are abandoning me,” because, also, I can be clingy to everyone. But we are so lucky to have each other, and I do genuinely feel like everyone has my back. You go through that sort of chaotic period where everyone feels a little insecure, but once you push through that you’re like, “Hold on, I love these b**ches and everyone has my back.”
On capturing the current moment of the younger culture in I Love LA:
RS: What I wanted to capture was—and we talked about this a lot—“Entourage for internet It girls.” I think I’ve yet to see the internet captured [in TV and film] as the business that it is. It was really fun and felt refreshing to do a show in L.A. and not have it be about Hollywood. Especially because you and I both came up on the internet and started our careers on the internet and we’re still doing stuff [there]. You are directing your movie, I’m making a TV show, but the internet is in our bones, and I wanted to have it exist in the show in the way it does in real life. I wanted the internet on the show to react and respond the way the internet does in real life without copying anything or feeling like we’re referencing a moment that already happened, because then that ages you and immediately feels out of date.
On directing for the first time in I Love LA’s season finale:
RS: I think I loved it. There were moments where I was like, “This is incredible. I’m in the flow.” Then there were moments where I was like, “I’m going to f**king die,” during the last two days—
JF: I wasn’t there.
RS: The last two days were hard. It was really hot out, and it was a lot of shooting.
JF: It’s a lesson: when you don’t write me into the scenes, it doesn’t go as well.
On writing Firstman’s character with him in mind:
RS: Everyone is genius. I’ll say, for the casting process, I genuinely feel so lucky to have every single person in the cast that we do.
Honestly, it was crazy for me and you because we were such close friends, and I wrote the character with you in mind. But I couldn’t say that because I didn’t have control. Because I’ve been an actor before who’s been promised something by someone who’s like, “I wrote this with you in mind,” and then two weeks later, they’re like, “The studio said you’re not relevant and ugly.”
JF: “So we’re going for a Rachel Sennott type.”
RS: “We’re going for a Rachel Sennott type, just more beautiful and successful.”
But deep down, I was like, “The second they see Jordan, they’re going to be blown away,” and they were, but I had to play it cool.
On a random childhood dream coming true:
JF: Do you remember any randomly specific dreams, like, 12 years later?
RS: Okay, this is really stupid, but…I remember getting manicures and flipping through magazines and being like, How do all of these girls have such shiny legs? I just thought their legs were like that, and I was like, “I’ll never have shiny legs. I’ll just always be ugly and a loser.” Then the first time I did a photo shoot, they put that weird goo on my legs, and I went—
JF: “I’m those girls.”
RS: “I’m those girls! I have shiny legs.”
JF: Wow. Now, you constantly have shiny legs. You have shiny everything now. You don’t shy away from the shine.
RS: I don’t shy away from the shine. I’m like, “Lube me up. Let’s go.”
JF: Headline: “Rachel Sennott Doesn’t Shy Away From the Shine.” There’s a lot of meanings there.
Photographer: Carin Backoff
Stylist: Alex White
Hair: Sami Knight
Makeup: Kennedy
Manicure: Stephanie Stone
[Photo Credit: Carin Backoff for ELLE Magazine]
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