GENERA+ION

“I am a star water polo player with a 4.1 GPA. I’m like, a lot. My tolerance for giving a fuck is, like, minimal”.

The words come out of Chester’s mouth. One of the school’s popular guys who has been sent to the office for wearing a rainbow-glittering croptop at school. Because this is the third time in a month, he is sent to the office of the new guidance counsellor to make sure that he ‘understands the consequences’.

If one’s still in doubt about which generation the series is about, it’s Generation Z. A series where high school bad boy and star quarterback unite in one queer fear of death, frontier-seeking sports star with dark skin and blonde hair flirting with his male mentor.

Genera+ion depicts teenagers who, despite living in a seemingly conservative town, use their individuality to explore modern love and sexuality. The show tackles everything from the struggles of growing up in today’s world, family conflicts and relationships between different generations to the emotional journey of exploring intimacy, sexuality and individuality.

Genera+ion challenges former high school stories, turns a new leaf and gathers a high-pitched self-conscious but deeply entertaining mosaic of the fluid and diverse identity – that Generation Z is known for. Genera+ion is an accurate portrait of the current generation and relates to present-day society, making it an important series of today.

DANIEL BARNZ

Daniel Barnz is an filmmaker and scriptwriter. Together with his husband Ben Barnz, an independent producer, and their  daugther Zelda, he has written and directed Genera+ion. It all started, when Daniel Barnz was saying goodnight to his daughter a few years ago, and she started telling him poignant but funny stories about the people in the Sexuality and Gender Alliance at her school. Off-handedly, he added a thought that the stories would make a pretty great TV show. The rest is history… Aside from Genera+ion, Barnz is also known for directing the film Cake, nominated for the Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice and SAG, and the award-winning Phoebe in Wonderland that premiered in competition at Sundance Festival in 2008, and which gave him his directional debut.

BEN BARNZ

Ben Barnz is an independent producer who often seeks out character-driven material. He frequently collaborates with his husband, filmmaker Daniel Barnz, and naturally he is the executive producer of Genera+ion, which has come to life by the joint effort of his husband, himself and their daughter Zelda, the latter being the one with the idea for the series. Ben Barnz produced the award-winning film Cake and also Phoebe in Wonderland. Soon he will be the producer of I’ll Drop A House On You with Plan B and Marco. Aside from this, he has written the book WE: An Adoption and A Memoir (2018) about the adoptation of Zelda, the legal and emotionally fraught battle with her birthfather and Barnz’ own way to parenthood. The book has been declared “essential reading” by American author Michael Cunningham.

HENRIK HØJER

Henrik Højer, MA in Scandinavian Literature and Film Studies from Aarhus University. Currently Associate Professor and Program-coordinator at VIA University College in Aarhus at the department of Film and Transmedia. He has furthermore given several lectures on film, television and transmedia and functioned as film and TV expert on TV (DR1), radio and in newspapers.
Henrik is also a writer, video-essayist and editor of the film journal 16:9 (www.16-9.dk) and have co-written and co-edited four anthologies on American TV drama (Fjernsyn for viderekomne, Turbine 2011), the Oscars (Guldfeber, Turbine 2013), Comedy (Helt til grin, 16:9 Books 2017) and Streaming (Streaming for viderekomne, 16:9 Books, 2020).