HBO Max’s hit show Genera+ion is finally coming back this Pride month! Season 1 is finishing up its second half, starting with episode 9 today!

The NOC got to talk to some of the cast in anticipation of the second half’s premiere, including Lukita Maxwell, aka Delilah herself! Delilah had one of the most shocking and tear-jerking plotlines during the first half of the season, and I got to (virtually) sit down and talk with Lukita about it as well as what we can expect to see when the show returns.

So Delilah’s pregnancy story has come to an end after such an eventful season. In the end, she ends up giving the baby to a sexy fireman. What was it like for you filming the whole thing, and how did you feel about how it all culminated?

MAXWELL: It was so fun and intense! Honestly those days filming that sequence were some of my most challenging and most rewarding days on set. Getting to work with Nathanya (Arianna) and Chloe (Naomi) was incredible. They are like my entire support group during the whole thing.

I love Delilah because she’s so outspoken and outgoing! Do you connect with her on that level?

I would love to be as strong and confident and unapologetic as Delilah is, and I am sometimes, but those are all of the things that I associated with her. Those are things they popped out to me when reading the script, how she’s unapologetically herself and not afraid to voice her opinion. She wants to change the world and she wants to enlist all of Gen Z to help fight that fight with her!

Delilah, Arianna, and Naomi are so close in the show. Is that kind of sisterhood present in set between you, Nathanya, and Chloe?

Oh my god yes! We would have days where it was just the three of us together shooting, eating lunch together. Nathanya didn’t actually drive at the time so we would always carpool to the set together. So yeah, we definitely got very close ESPECIALLY after those bathroom scenes. 

The connection between Delilah and J was a pretty big surprise. Can we expect to see any more scenes between the two would be parents?

With the second half of the season, yes, but I don’t want to spoil too much! There’s some spicy stuff going on [laughs] some love triangles and secrets.

What do you and the cast like to do during downtime between filming?

We’re all kind of foodies. Everyone has such an extensive list of places to go find food in LA, so we all go out and eat together often. Marwan, who plays Bo, is like a foodie supreme. He has the best list! If you need any recommendations for food on LA, he’s got you for sure. 

How relatable is Genera+ion to your real life high school experiences?

Not at all. I grew up in a very conservative environment, and some of the characters are growing up with conservative parents, but I didn’t really have that experience in my friend group. I didn’t have a group like in the show that I completely understood my perspective if I was questioning my sexual or racial identity. There were no other friends who were people of color or out and queer, or even any who really knew what queer was. So I kind of found that online, like a lot of Gen Z and Millennial kids do. I wish I had Genera+ion as a kid, I would have f***ed with it heavy [laughs]!

It’s honestly great that there’s a show like this one that can speak to this sort of similar-yet-unique experience that we’re all going through.

Yes honestly! I can’t tell you how many emails I get from people watching that say they feel like they’ve found a chosen family and that’s ultimately all you can ask for. Touch one soul and it changes your life.

What is your favorite moment from the first half of season 1?

Hmm, probably episode 7, when we’re all in the motel pool. We were all just really really having a good time. There was one moment when we were all just jumping around and dancing in the pool and they kind of just started filming and got footage of that. We all love each other so much and are so comfortable with each other! Even though we’ve only been filming since August of last year, we’ve known each other since August of 2019. 

Which character can you see yourself getting along with the most in real life?

Definitely Riley. I can’t tell if part of me wanted to be Riley or date her, or maybe both! *laughs* We have very similar interests in photography and style. I would have loved to be her friend!

Delilah made a really big decision, and not an easy one either. What do you think was going through her head during the entire thing?

That scene when Delilah enters her bedroom after the events of the day, I think that’s the first moment where she gets a second to breathe. To even really begin to process what happened that day and how her body betrayed her in that way. Delilah is so in control of everything in her life, so for her body, of all things, to take her by surprise? I think that she’s very confused, but also at the same time doesn’t get caught up in it. She’s mostly like “Okay, I know what I need to do. I know what steps I need to take.” She’s very logical and pragmatic about what the next step is. I mean, she’s standing here, in her childhood bedroom, looking at all her stuffed animals and thinking about how this morning she was a kid. And she’s immediately grown up in this day and in this moment and time, her life has completely changed. I think that in block 2, she’s trying to figure out what adolescence is to her. What a “normal” teen experience looks like to her. I think she’s just trying to fit in a little more because she doesn’t want to be put in a box by other people.

Can you tell us anything about this upcoming second half that you’re particularly excited about?

Well, there are quite a few love triangles going on, and this second half really plays with the themes of secrets and lies. Also how adolescents sometimes put on a face and kind of change how they talk to different people because they’re testing out their identity and trying to figure out who they are and how they fit in the world.

Make sure to watch Genera+ion on HBO Max to see what kinds of trouble Lukita and the gang get in when new episodes start airing June 17!