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Gen Z directors Curry Barker (left) and Kane Parsons are enjoying a triumphant Hollywood debut. A24 has 81.4 million reasons to be thrilled with the blockbuster release of Kane Parsons‘ horror film “Backrooms,” and now they have one more: the indie studio’s contract with the 20-year-old director included rights to the sequel, Page Six Hollywood has learned.
Parsons, who lives with his parents in Northern California, better clear his schedule. One of the town’s foremost reps tells us, “He doesn’t have an agent and everyone is after him.”
The record-setting, one-two box office punch of “Obsession” from 26-year-old Curry Barker and “Backrooms” from Parsons has Hollywood in a lather, with some insiders even hoping we might be witnessing a moment analogous to the launch of the American New Wave which kicked off in 1967 with the releases of Arthur Penn’s “Bonnie and Clyde” and Mike Nichols’ “The Graduate.” (Or is it just the next boomlet of innovative horror films like “Paranormal Activity,” “Saw,” “The Blair Witch Project” and “Get Out.”)
Chiwetel Ejiofor in a scene from “Backrooms.” A24 via APWhile there have been such horror breakouts in the past — “Weapons,” which landed Amy Madigan an Oscar and is in development on a prequel surrounding her “Aunt Gladys” character, and “Longlegs” are more recent examples — the twin films come a few months after Mark Fischbach (known as “Markiplier”) over-performed with his self-financed, YouTube-incubated horror film “Iron Lung.”
What’s different this time is that insiders are saying the current excitement stems from the quality of the filmmaking and that both “Obession” and “Backrooms” have punctured some widely held conventions that have dictated modern Hollywood.
The most notable being that Gen Z, it turns out, actually loves the movies and has been begging for Hollywood to listen.
“This was a massive piece of IP for a generation but previously [Hollywood] was dismissive if something was on YouTube or Reddit because the belief was, ‘Well, why would anyone then go to the theater?’” said a top studio executive. “So there is this ‘for-us-by-us’ thing that is resonating and a new understanding that IP can be grown on the internet.”
During its opening weekend, 86% of the audience for “Backrooms” was under the age of 35, with an average age of 25, according to the distributor’s data. And the first two weekends of “Obsession” were driven by 75% of moviegoers that were between 18-34 years old, (Gen Z’s age cutoff is those born in 2012), according to a knowledgeable source.
According to a December 2025 study from CinemaUnited, Gen Z goes to the movies more than six times a year, compared to less than five in 2024. Nearly half (41%) of Gen Z moviegoers went at least six times last year, compared to 31% in 2022. Those numbers outpace every other generation. And while there is a history of younger audiences driving the box office — ask your parents how many times they saw “Star Wars” or “Jaws” — this is a generation that grew up on streaming-only releases and there has long been the perception that they felt the movie theater was too old fashioned.
Inde Navarrette stars in the smash horror hit “Obsession.” ©Focus Features/Courtesy Everett CollectionBut catering to Gen Z could be tricky for major studios, given that the greenlight power in Hollywood still resides in the over-60 crowd. After all, “Obsession” wasn’t some studio-developed project. Focus bought it after it was screened at the Toronto International Film Festival, as part of its “Midnight Madness” block last fall.
And “Backrooms” was a major bet by A24, which partnered with James Wan, Shawn Levy and Peter Chernin to win a bidding war in 2023, shortly after Parsons’ original YouTube series went viral. (Lucas Ford is the onetime assistant at Levy’s 21 Laps Entertainment who has was been credited with first discovering “Backrooms,” and messaging Parsons on YouTube.)
The box office is now pacing for its best post-Covid year as the industry hopes it’s finally getting out of the rubble of five years of industry contraction and labor strikes.
This year’s on track to be the first since 2019 to surpass $9B and Cinemark is coming off its best May in its history (AMC said it had its best-performing May since before the pandemic.) Per Comscore, this was the first May since 2019 that surpassed $1B since 2019, something that would not have been possible without the performances of “Obsession” and “Backrooms.”
Any hope in recapturing the magic of movie theaters from the pre-streaming days may come down to a bet on revitalizing youth-skewing cinema, a once hallmark of Hollywood in the John Hughes era.
English (US)