MIDDLEBURG \u2013 There are small snippets drawn from Kenny White\u2019s awkward past in some of the memories of bullying, peer pressure, suicide, nonconformity and an unstable homelife and his new release, \u201cThe Kool Kids.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
White is a writer, director and producer who\u2019s lived in Middleburg since 2019. \u201cThe Kool Kids\u201d is his 13th film, and it\u2019s his third as the director, which includes\u00a0the 2020 horror film \u201cHomecoming Massacre\u201d and the 2008 comedy\/romance \u201cMaybe Tomorrow.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
In \u201cThe Kool Kids,\u201d he knows adolescents often struggle to find their comfort zone \u2013 some more than others. His movie focuses on three who feel\u00a0especially ostracized. According to White, their coming-of-age story goes terribly wrong after they bond over their tortured pasts to teach others what it feels like \u201cnot to have the upper hand.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
According to White, 42, \u201ca lesson in morals quickly turns deadly.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
A teenage skateboarder named Casey (Dante Bravo) befriended two fellow outcasts (Jessica Norman as Gwen and Austin as Vinnie) in a high school full of bullies. They shared a love of underground music \u2013 and the thirst to get even against the cool crowd. But the storyline turns dark when it leads to murder and kidnapping.\u00a0<\/p>\n
White\u2019s movie also provided a platform for several new music artists. The soundtrack, TheKoolKidsMovie.com, featured Zanias, Jessica Lea Mayfield, Chrome Waves, Johnny Dynamite and the Bloodsuckers, Terror Forms, Joey Sadass, Mr. Bella and Tye Talley.\u00a0 It’s available\u00a0on Spotify and YouTube.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Kool Kids\u201d will be released for rental or purchase on Friday, Oct. 24, on Apple TV, Google TV and YouTube. The DVD, Blu-ray and 4K UHD copies will be exclusively available from the production company’s website (whitehairproductions.com).\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of it is really kind of based on my childhood, my growing up with the challenges you face,\u201d White said. \u201cPeople give you a hard time and mess with you. I saw it as a kid. I saw a lot of other people face it. There are\u00a0actually a couple of my childhood bullying incidents that come to life on the screen.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Although he\u2019s from Indianapolis, much of the movie was shot in Middleburg, including Omega and Foxmeadow parks. Other locations included his house, the Prime Stop Convenience Store on Peoria Road in Orange Park and Air-Max Heating and Cooling on College Drive in Middleburg.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Archetype, a music venue in Jacksonville, and the Amelia Island Museum were also utilized.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I wanted to tell a story that really captures the struggles of teenagers today while celebrating the creativity and talent in our community,” White said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI would say the entire production team is from Clay County, except for one of our co-producers. He is from the Palm Bay area. He’s a community leader down there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
White\u2019s story travels. Whether it\u2019s in Indianapolis or Clay County, young people too often feel tormented as they try to find their way through emotional development.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you watch the movie, anytime you see someone being bullied, it\u2019s retelling a fictionalized version of something that happened to me or someone that I knew,\u201d White said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But unlike his characters in \u201cThe Kool Kids,\u201d he said he\u00a0didn\u2019t get even.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MIDDLEBURG \u2013 There are small snippets drawn from Kenny White\u2019s awkward past in some of the memories of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":325811,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[5229,15024,15015,15023,15026,3188,15016,723,15021,7310,15020,15022,7648,15018,15017,15025,15019,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-325810","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-argyle","10":"tag-clay-county","11":"tag-doctors-inlet","12":"tag-eagle-harbor","13":"tag-fl","14":"tag-fleming-island","15":"tag-florida","16":"tag-green-cove-springs","17":"tag-jacksonville","18":"tag-keystone-heights","19":"tag-lake-asbury","20":"tag-margaret","21":"tag-middleburg","22":"tag-orange-park","23":"tag-pace-island","24":"tag-penney-farms","25":"tag-united-states","26":"tag-united-states-of-america","27":"tag-unitedstates","28":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","29":"tag-us","30":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325810","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=325810"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/325810\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/325811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=325810"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=325810"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=325810"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}