Rachel Sennott celebrates Ayo Edebiri for EW's 2023 Entertainers of the Year: 'I feel truly lucky to know her'

The "Bottoms" star and co-writer pays tribute to her longtime friend and frequent collaborator.

After bursting onto the scene in 2022 with season 1 of The Bear, for which she earned her first Emmy nomination among many others, the spotlight was truly shining bright on Ayo Edebiri in 2023.

On TV, she returned for the second season of The Bear, earning rave reviews for her expanded role. She also guest-starred on two episodes of Abbott Elementary (playing the sister of Quinta Brunson's Janine), as an episode of Black Mirror, among others, and continued her run voicing multiple characters on Big Mouth, while also bringing life to animated characters on the series Mulligan and Clone High.

In theaters, audiences heard her in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem and Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, and laughed at her antics in the comedies Theater Camp and Bottoms.

It's in the latter where she costarred with her longtime friend and frequent collaborator Rachel Sennott, who also co-wrote the movie. Here, Sennott celebrates Edebiri's many accomplishments and rising star.

I've had the privilege of working with and watching Ayo write and perform in a huge range of settings. We met while filming a friend's sketch in college and I was blown away by her. She was so funny in even her smallest actions but also so real and committed. I spent the entire shoot trying not to break with laughter.

This happened to me years later on a bigger scale with Bottoms. I once again watched as Ayo improvised a genius monologue about a youth pastor on the spot and had to fight so hard not to laugh because I knew I couldn't ruin a take that good. During the shoot, she also showed me the pilot for a new show she had shot, called The Bear. We sat on the floor of our tiny trailer and watched it on her phone. She said something along the lines of "I hope people like it," which, BABE, they did!!

Even though all of her characters are so different, whether she's performing, writing, or writing on the spot (a new way to say improvising that I just came up with), there's a shared level of commitment and honesty. She also brings that level of commitment to her projects as a whole, becoming fully invested in the overall outcome of the movie and sharing insightful feedback on how to change it for the better. I feel truly lucky to know her and be her friend and I can't wait to see all that she accomplishes.

More EW Entertainers of the Year 2023:

• EW celebrates "Barbenheimer"

• Chase Stokes celebrates Kelsea Ballerini

• Gabrielle Union celebrates Beyoncé
  

• RuPaul celebrates Sasha Colby

• James Marsden celebrates Jury Duty

• Brian Jordan Alvarez celebrates M3GAN

• Troy Baker celebrates Pedro Pascal

• Owenn celebrates Taylor Swift

• Matt Rogers celebrates Vanderpump Rules

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly.