‘To be honest with you, before I went secondary school I thought that the kids they would be like really mature and like by the time I reached Year Ten I’d be fully mature and everything. And I’d lose my like funsense and stuff… But, I don’t know if it’s just my class in particular but we really haven’t matured at all… I don’t want to be the serious adult and have serious children and have serious future in a serious house and serious everything.’
Alecky Blythe’s engrossing verbatim play tells the stories of a generation. Created from five years of interviews with twelve young people from across the UK, Our Generation is a captivating portrait of their teenage years as they journey into adulthood.
Often too extraordinary to be fiction, this funny and moving play is for anyone who is – or has ever been – a teenager.
It was co-produced by the National Theatre, London, and Chichester Festival Theatre in 2022, directed by Daniel Evans.
‘Extraordinary… shines a light on a generation dealt a spectacularly bad hand… a terrific piece of work’
— Evening Standard
‘Magnificent… masterful… will steal your heart’
— Guardian
‘Dazzling… a beautiful and funny journey through twelve young people’s lives… The dialogue in this extraordinary state-of-the-nation play is comic gold dust… Through a dynamic distilling of her ongoing encounters with these young people, Blythe and her team respect and explore each of them as individuals… It’s a thrill to spend time inside these young people’s lives; it’s hard to imagine getting so close to these characters without the immersive documentary-style process that Blythe has honed over several plays… eye-opening, generous and brilliantly inventive’
— Time Out
‘Thrilling… a frank, fond tribute to the agony and ecstasy of generation Snapchat’
— Daily Telegraph
‘An extraordinary show… we grow to love these kids, fear for them, celebrate with them, laugh and cry with them’
— Broadway World
‘Wise, beguiling, hilarious and gut-punchingly moving: a living portrait of adolescence, in all its overwhelming intensity… supremely lovable’
— iNews
