It’s a spotlight for the full spectrum of gender and sexual identity that the younger generation has come to embrace.
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The series is created by 19-year-old Zelda Barnes and her father, Daniel, making it the rare look at growing up in Gen Z that is actually made by a member of Gen Z.
So when Smith made his debut as Chester in Genera+ion, it was treated by critics as something of a revelation. Still, it cannoned him to the top of Young Hollywood casting wishlists, and soon Smith went from singing and dancing for the director of Moulin Rouge! to the industry’s new in-demand action star, with lead roles in Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom and the Pokémon film Detective Pikachu. While at the time one of the most expensive TV shows in history, its run was short-lived at just 11 episodes. “But Chester has really taught me about aesthetics and angles, and fashion and makeup and all this kind of stuff.”īorn in Anaheim, the fifth of nine siblings, Smith got his biggest break in 2016 when he was cast as one of the young leads in Baz Luhrmann’s ambitious Netflix series The Get Down, a musical drama about life in the South Bronx in the late 1970s. “Because I don’t have any experience looking good.”Ĭlocking the eyeroll coming from the other end of the Zoom connection, he grins sheepishly. I’m gonna do my little angles.’ So I’m looking at myself in the selfie camera being like, I hope this works out…” He doubles over laughing. “But Chester genuinely is like, ‘I look hot, I look really good. “Sometimes when I have to be, like, ‘hot’ as a character, I can play the humor of that, where I’m making a joke of it,” he says. That’s what Justice Smith grappled with, and why he felt himself blossom after acting out the scene.
For some queer members of Gen Z, it’s just the reality of how they live their lives, which is its own, beautiful thing.
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For about two minutes, it seems as if Chester’s skin is peeled back to reveal every flamboyance, anti-gender flourish, and quirk-not to mention the comfort of knowing that others think he’s fly, too. Then it’s time to film the selfie video for social media, selling the look for the people.įor some older gay men watching, it’s a wish-fulfillment fantasy, glittering with the confidence and openness they could not have. Working his angles, he begins applying eyeshadow and some sparkling highlighter, offsetting the fuchsia pussy-bow blouse, string of pearls, and striped cardigan he decides to put on. Lithe and shirtless, his lavender hair dye glistening in the morning light, he starts admiring himself in the mirror. The song “Lucky” by Britney Spears begins blasting, a campy bubblegum ballad from the pop star so underrated and beloved by her most devoted fans that the synthesized “thunks” of the intro trigger Pavlovian shrieks of, “Oh my god, it’s ‘Lucky!’” from any gay man within earshot.Ĭhester, the gay water polo star and resident rabble rouser played by Justice Smith, is getting ready for school. There is a sequence in the fourth episode of HBO Max’s Genera+ion that is a veritable gay fantasia.