What does genuine connection look like in Los Angeles? Or, perhaps more pointedly, does anyone want genuine connection in the City Of Angels, which seems—at least according to I Love LA—filled to the brim with vapid, selfish social climbers who cannot fathom any kind of interaction that’s not inherently transactional?
Therein lies the central tension of “Upstairses,” the show’s fourth episode which mostly takes place at what even I have to admit looks like an insufferable party (at Elijah Wood’s house but not hosted by him, of course). Maia (Rachel Sennott) and Tallulah (Odessa A’zion) are still riding high from the way they utterly destroyed that prison nepo baby who’d come between Tallulah and her stolen Balenciaga bag. They’d won the social media troll war and now our favorite chaos of an influencer is rejoicing because Balenciaga actually sent her a replacement bag. What else might she want? (Well, ideally some better deals and a steady sense that her career is going somewhere, but I guess a free designer bag is a good start.)
And what better way to continue celebrating than heading to a party thrown by none other than Quenlin Blackwell (played by Blackwell herself) that Charlie (Jordan Firstmann) assures them will have the correct famous to non-famous ratio (80/20 if you’re wondering). Maia, of course, sees an opportunity for networking and for advancing Tallulah’s profile (they could “level up,” she insists), while Alani (True Whitaker) is all but freaking out about going to a house owned by that Lord Of The Rings actor.
The party is a gathering of very hot, ridiculously dressed young upstarts and influencers. Maia is keen on following unspoken local guidelines (“There’s this rule in L.A. that you can’t ask a more famous person to make a TikTok with you”) while Tallulah just wants to feel things out and have a good time. Thankfully they quickly find Quenlin, who remains obsessed with “the bag girl” (“I’m the bag bitch!”), immediately pulling Tallulah away from Maia and Alani.
Their only directive: have fun, have drinks, and stay downstairs. Which, considering Alani keeps hoping Elijah Wood is around (he’s not a partier, she’s told), feels like an obvious invitation to head upstairs to snoop around and maybe,find themselves in the actor’s security feeds which he may or may not jerk off to later.
As the two BFFs do begin to snoop around this quite gorgeous house, they eventually walk in on…you guessed it, Elijah Wood. In his PJs. Watching The Simpsons. It’s a hilarious tableau (and enough to almost give Alani a panic attack) and one that begs for the two friends to say hi and invite themselves into what feels like the straight version of “gay guy music video night,” which basically means Elijah Wood is stoned and watching his favorite clips from TV shows and films he loves (all while quite awkwardly making conversation with the two beautiful girls who drop in on his private night in).
It is too much of a dream come true for Alani, who has rewritten a brief Q&A moment from college way back when as an “I almost hooked up with him” story with nary a hint of narcissistic self-awareness. The more the three of them hang, the clearer it is that I Love LA’s version of Elijah Wood is a consummate introvert baffled by technology. I cannot understand why he’d have let his house be overrun by influencers for a party. But such niceties (he wants to remember Alani this time, putting her in his memory palace) are immediately read by Maia and Alani as something else. He’s in his PJs. In his bed. With two girls. When he asks them to join him in bed (for which they’d need to put on their own robes, easily available in the bathroom), the two assume they’re in for their very first threesome.
It’s all quite laughable and rather expected even as the scene insists we’re being offered an unexpected twist: For Elijah Wood, once he sees Alani and Maia have taken all of their clothes under their robes (why does this keep happening to him?!), he realizes no one ever just wants to hang. No one ever just wants to be his friend. No one ever just wants to connect. “No one wants to be friends with Elijah,” he says, while basically running them off (as Smash Mouth’s “All Star,” from Shrek plays in the background, of course).
By that point, they’re not the only ones wishing to leave the party. Charlie, who’d broken off from the group almost as soon as he clocked a beautiful looking man in tight jeans and a ringer tee (“USA Cheerleader”), had hoped his new friend’s suggestion to go to a second location (to get ice, wink wink) was code for something and not, as it turns out, a chance to drive 45 minutes to the nearest gas station to get, uh, ice. Worse still, when he tries to feel up the guy in his car, he realizes he’s been reading him all wrong: “I’m not gay,” he says. “I’m Catholic.”
This clearly happens a lot to him, what with people mistaking his niceness for gayness (a fascinating blurred distinction worth unpacking). Still, Charlie is now stuck with happy-go-lucky ringer tee boy who gets recognized at a gas station by a throng of girls, and that’s when it dawns on Charlie: Oh, this guy is famous. Internet famous. He’s a Christian singer. In his words, Lucas Landry wants to “spread a message of love. God’s love and his mercy. His love.” Charlie’s torn because he obviously has no time for any of that but if that Vegas residency is really as big as he’s making it out to be, this may be his ticket away from stylist jail. Not that he gets to stay too long at the party after their ice escapade for us to find out.
But perhaps no one wanted to leave the party as quickly as Tallulah, who comes face to face with the reality of L.A. influencers. What’s long been a lark for her, a mix of chaos, mess, and spontaneity, is suddenly shown to be quite an amateur way of tackling online fame. Quenlin is nothing if not a professional; when she suggests they do a TikTok together (Maia’s dream!) to a Landry song, no less, she’s happy to do one take of them lip-syncing a Kramer Vs. Kramer scene (iconic). But when Quenlin isn’t happy and has her do it over and over again like some Gen Z David Fincher, it starts dawning on Tallulah that she may be in over her head.
Quenlin demands costume changes, more on-point lip-syncing, and better facial expressions. And that’s all before Tallulah stumbles onto her clickfarm in some shady room where it’s clear Quenlin is manipulating her views and clicks and engagement, proving that if Tallulah is not ready to be as calculating, she may not find a way to make it in L.A. after all. So when she’s unceremoniously dumped by Quenlin once she realizes Landry himself is at the party…well, she runs toward Maia and her friends, hoping to put this “party” behind her.
Four episodes in, it’s clear I Love LA has plenty of fun material to play with (especially when it comes to influencer life) but the line between cartoonish Gen Z Angelenos and razor-sharp satire is so fine that I hope we’re slowly building to something rather than stringing together outrageous scenes that allow Sennott to say things like “Oh my god, Elijah Wood could have killed us!”
Stray observations
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- • How much of Alani’s character is born out of her real life as a nepo baby? (She’s Forest Whitaker’s daughter.)
- • In an episode full of ridiculous outfits, you really can’t beat Charlie’s pink muppet coat for most eye-catching and also most absurd. (It did not look like it was cold enough for such a garment!)
- • Most Gen Z line of the episode: “It’s that yellow family show” (about The Simpsons).
- • Caitlin “girl who is going to be okay” Reilly is great as Quenlin’s go-to girl, and I only wish we’d gotten more of her.
- • An episode where Odessa A’zion basically dresses up like a witch (complete with a hat) came out the same weekend as Wicked: For Good.
