From lip-syncing to life lessons, Gen Z and retirees build bonds

Retired engineer Dave Ball is still in slight disbelief that he’s about to make his primetime television debut. “Who is going to tap me on the shoulder at 80 and say, do you want to be on a TV show? I didn’t think that was ever going to happen!”

Dave and Vya in Old People’s Home for Teenagers.Credit: ABC

The great-grandfather is one of 10 lucky seniors who were selected to participate in the second series of Old People’s Home for Teenagers, a highly watchable social experiment that has retirees aged 71 to 94 bonding with a group of adolescents aged between 14 and 16 years old. This season the show sets up camp in a Sydney retirement home with the action narrated by the dulcet tones of Annabel Crabb as the juniors and seniors take part in a series of activities designed to build intergenerational connections.

The seniors are introduced to Gen Z pastimes such as an emotionally vulnerable podcasting session and a lip-sync video they create to Ben Lee’s anthemic belter We’re All in This Together. Ball, who was in a band during his youth, particularly enjoyed busting out his best moves for the latter. “I’ve never done that before. When I started the show, who knew what I was going to be doing. The lip-syncing was quite fun, I don’t know how it turned out, but it was one of the best experiences on the show.”

For Vya, one of the teens on the series, she developed a close friendship with Dave despite the decades between them. “Dave was one of the first people I spoke to on the show. And I just remember he had this very cool, still young aura about him, an energy that was very radiant and positive. Meeting him I was like, oh my God, you’re like an old version of me.”

From her time on the show, the 15-year-old now feels that older people are sorely underestimated in terms of what they have to share with the younger generation. “I learnt so much from them. I learned that we’re not that different. And it was so good to hear their experiences, because things that have happened in their lives could totally happen in my life at any point. Now I know someone who’s had that happen and if I ever have to go through it, I’m ready. It did make growing up feel less scary.”

The show is pure feel-good TV as over the course of the new season viewers can watch the heartwarming journey of the teens’ self-confidence soaring as their older and wiser buddies cheer them on. Meanwhile the seniors increase their physical capabilities as they push themselves to keep up with the teens and also form friendships to battle the pervasive problem of loneliness in old age.

Ball has noted a marked change in some of his fellow participants, particularly those who were struggling with reclusiveness and depression. “When you’re in the latter years of your life, you sometimes need the strength of others to help you get through to the next day,” he says. “And I’ve certainly seen the change in some of the seniors since they’ve done the show. They were fairly negative to start with, but they’re more open and can enjoy the life that they have now, rather than sitting in their four walls with the curtains down. It’s definitely made a difference.”

While the show’s filming has now wrapped up many of the participants have continued to meet outside of the show with Dave and Vya catching up to celebrate one another’s birthdays and exchange gifts. There is also a thoroughly modern method many of the participants are using to keep in contact.

“We’ve got a WhatsApp group to chat to each other,” reveals Ball. “We’re clued up now. Some of the seniors never knew what that was, so they’ve learnt some things. We’re using modern technology to keep in touch even if we don’t see each other.”

Old People’s Home for Teenagers returns to the ABC, Tuesdays 8.30pm.

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