This article appears in the pages of V124: Generation V, available for purchase now at shop.vmagazine.com.

One January day, Jack Dylan Grazer is procrastinating—not on classwork, but on preparing to accept an award from the Hollywood Critics Association: That evening, the HCA would present him and fellow up-and-comers like Kelvin Harrison Jr. and Noah Jupe statues declaring them the “Next Generation of Hollywood.” “I don’t know [who I’ll thank yet]…My mom, for sure, my dad and grandpa, the Hollywood Foreign Press,” says Grazer, invoking not the HCA, but the HFPA, voting body behind the Golden Globes. Whether a slip of the tongue (Grazer speaks with rapid-fire exuberance) or a Freudian slip (the Globes had aired that week), his impromptu practice speech demonstrates Grazer’s inherent irrepressibility—a quality that needled his teachers but turned casting agents’ heads early on. “When I was six, I was dancing in a parking lot, and a woman said,‘I want you!’” Grazer says, recalling the start of his acting trajectory, which eventually landed him in mega-hit horror film It. “That was a dream,” he says of bonding with castmates like Finn Wolfhard.“It was like summer camp, with the aspect of a killer clown.”

More grown-up fears arose on the set of HBO’s forthcoming We Are Who We Are, which served as a test of his acting chops: “Before, it was fun-acting,” he says. “This show helped me prove to myself that I really can act.” On set, Grazer hit it off with avuncular auteur Luca Guadagnino.“Everything he says is like a painting; he verbalizes emotions better than anyone,” Grazer says.“It was a wonderful, terrifying experience.”

Professional development aside, the shoot came with less desirable after-effects—namely frosted tips. “It was for the show…I didn’t know they were going to dye it!” says Grazer, running a hand through his half-blond curls. “I have dog hair now! It used to be soft…” Still, Grazer finds an upshot: a link between the hair and Hollywood’s erstwhile next generations.“I hated it before,” he admits.“But [I do have] a Justin Timberlake-thing going on now. And I like that!”