I Love LA Review: Rachel Sennott Has Her Own LA Story

The first image in I Love LA is of the HBO comedy's creator and star, Rachel Sennott, completely buried in her phone. She's so buried that we can't even fully see her at first; director Lorene Scafaria frames the shot so that Sennott's eyes and brows are visible above her mobile device but the rest of her face is obscured. That choice immediately tells us something about the characters in this show, particularly Sennott's clout-chasing Maia: that they are so obsessed with image and perceived success that they, and, by extension we, can't view themselves fully anymore.

What happens next — Maia has sex with her boyfriend, Dylan (Josh Hutcherson), and refuses to stop even when an earthquake hits — is one of the reasons why I Love LA has already invited comparisons to Girls. Like the creator of that previous HBO series, Lena Dunham, Sennott is extremely sex-forward and has no qualms whatsoever about being provocative on camera. While she first earned widespread notice for her comedic viral videos, including one that mocked LA culture's depiction in film, she eventually became, like Dunham, an indie darling, starring in Shiva Baby, directed by her NYU classmate Emma Seligman; horror flick Bodies Bodies Bodies; and Bottoms, which she co-wrote with Seligman and starred in with another NYU friend, Ayo Edebiri. Sennott also has a flair for unearthing the revealing and amusing contradictions that exist in perpetually aggrieved, deeply self-involved people, and Dunham does, too.

But to present I Love LA as merely a Gen Z version of Girls is a reductive way of describing this deeply observant, uncompromising work of television. While it follows a group of dissatisfied, ambitious people in their twenties navigating careers and relationships, which is like Girls but also about a hundred other shows, I Love LA more quickly establishes a sense of purpose than the Hannah Horvath Story did. That purpose reveals itself with increasing clarity during each of Season 1's eight episodes. (The first one debuts Sunday night on HBO and HBO Max.)

9.0

I Love LA

at HBO

Like

• Wry and funny dialogue and an authentic depiction of the absurdities of influencer culture

Dislike

• It's by design that the characters can be insufferable. But their decisions and behavior may grate on some viewers.

I Love LA is frequently funny, but it is not quite a satire of influencer culture. It's more accurate to call it a critique of that world that slowly, slyly morphs into an indictment. Maia works at a Los Angeles marketing and branding firm where she's trying to climb the ladder by sucking up to her boss, played by Leighton Meester with the exact right touch of "White Woman's Instagram" phoniness. (Between this and her recent appearance in Season 2 of Nobody Wants This, Meester is really owning female characters who would absolutely ask to speak to the manager.)

When Maia's estranged friend Tallulah (Odessa A'zion) suddenly shows up in LA — a city they had planned to move to together until Tallulah, a social media personality, decided to cut off her client relationship with Maia and stay in New York — Maia shifts into old patterns that may or may not be more reflective of who she is at her core. She becomes extra aggressive at work, pacing in the office while loudly negotiating on Tallulah's behalf, and jumping on her makeshift treadmill at home so she can multitask as effectively as possible. She and Tallulah, a powder keg of casual theft and irresponsible behavior, immediately plug into each other's sockets, for better or worse, and start finishing each other's sentences and reigniting the same affection and envy that has animated their relationship. They seem to care about each other, but they care just as much about how their respective successes can boost each other's clout. Sennott and A'zion make beautiful harmonies out of that tug-of-war between motivations.

I Love LA has been crafted by people, Sennott among them, who aren't merely trying to mimic the behavior of people whose lives are rooted deeply in social media. They understand that realm from the inside out and have constructed this series based on that foundation, with an eye fixed on the meta. While Dunham and her fellow Girls producers were criticized for casting nepo babies, Sennott and company have taken a similar approach with a knowingness that suggests their series has been designed like this deliberately. A'zion, whose character seems allergic to any boundaries that keep her from wealth and fame, is the real-life daughter of Better Things creator Pamela Adlon. Another friend of Maia and Tallulah, Alani, is the daughter of a famous director. She's portrayed by True Whitaker, the daughter of Oscar-winning actor and filmmaker Forest Whitaker. Every detail in I Love LA knowingly suggests that connections are everything, while questioning whether those connections are meaningful or not.

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Some of the writers on this series have worked on very generationally and culturally aware TV comedies, like The Other Two and Search Party. That shows. The dialogue is sharp and culturally pointed, particularly when it comes out of the mouth of Maia's friend Charlie, a stylist played by Jordan Firstman. When Maia complains about receiving voice memos from Tallulah, Charlie immediately agrees with her: "Voice memos are so narcissistic. It's like, bitch, you're doing a podcast." In another episode he declares with full confidence, "Reputations ended in 2017. Everybody knows that." It is a massive cliché to refer to someone as an icon when they've done nothing, over the long term, to earn icon status. But also: Charlie is an icon.

The people involved in making this series have been raised by the internet, and so have the individuals in this 21st-century City of Angels, which is still depicted as a place where it's easy to believe that the glossiest of dreams can come true. The first episode contains what is practically a shot-for-shot remake of Randy Newman's music video for this show's namesake, "I Love LA," a celebration of all the things that traditionally have made this town seem like a fantasy land: palm trees, beautiful women, a mix of people unified by their love of the sunniest city in America. As the episodes progress and take increasingly surprising turns, the lies in those lyrics and images reveal themselves. "Everybody's very happy," Newman swears in that song. I Love LA, the TV show, is here to prove otherwise.

Premieres: Sunday, Nov. 2 at 10:30/9:30c on HBO and HBO Max
Who's in it: Rachel Sennott, Odessa A'zion, Jordan Firstman, True Whitaker, Josh Hutcherson
Who's behind it: Rachel Sennott
For fans of: Girls, LA, sharp explorations of social media culture
Episodes watched: 8 of 8