Published on September 1st, 2022 | by Darren Paltrowitz
0Stars & Crew From “Growing Up” On The Inspirational Disney & More
Disney+ is the streaming home for entertainment from Disney, Pixar, Marvel, Star Wars, and National Geographic. Its library currently features over 500 films, 15,000 episodes, and 80 Disney+ Originals, much of which exclusively available through Disney+. Popular original titles within the Disney+ library include The Falcon & The Winter Soldier, The Mandalorian and High School Musical: The Musical: The Series.
New from Disney+ is Growing Up, which is set to premiere on the popular streamer on September 8, 2022. Created by Brie Larson and Culture House, Growing Up” is an innovative hybrid docu-series that explores the challenges, triumphs, and complexities of adolescence through ten compelling coming of age stories. The series uses narrative, experimental, and documentary filmmaking to follow one casted individual, ages 18 through 22, as they tell their story. They represent a wide range of lived experiences, giving audiences emotionally-powerful narratives that offer an engaging look at teenage-hood and the diverse social, familial, and internal obstacles young people face on their path to self-discovery and acceptance. Each 30-minute episode features one young person, or “hero,” and their experience growing up, and each episode is anchored by a deeply-personal interview that allows the series’ heroes to walk us through their childhood and teenage years. Alongside these interviews, creative cinematic reenactments help bring the major inflection points of these storytellers to life.
On August 21, 2022, I had the pleasure of speaking with a varieties of the people who made Growing Up a reality — including Nicole Galovski (Showrunner/Executive Producer/Director), Kishori Rajan (Director), Smriti Mundhra (Director), Ashley Eakin (Director), Gavin Arneson (Hero), Ekwa Msangi (Director), Elegance Bratton (Director), Amiri Nash (Hero), Vanessa Aryee (Hero) and Rudy Valdez (Director) — via Zoom, as embedded below. More on Growing Up can be found here, here and here.