TLC has ordered a nonscripted series featuring transgender teen and LGBT activist Jazz Jennings and her family, with the working title All That Jazz, that will focus on the 14-year-old, her siblings and her parents.
Jennings, assigned male at birth, began expressing interest in things associated with girls while still in early childhood. With the support of her parents and doctors, she has been living "life as her true female self" since her fifth birthday, when she wore a girl's bathing suit to her birthday party, TLC said. Since then, Jennings has become an advocate for the LGBT community, appearing at events and on national news programs, as well as in in a YouTube series, and writing a book, I Am Jazz, about her experiences.
Last year Jennings was named by Time magazine as one of "The 25 Most Influential Teens of 2014."
The TLC series will follow "Jazz and her family’s complex, loving and fascinating story" as she crosses into adolescence, "learning to navigate how a transgender teen approaches dating, sleepovers [and] avoiding male puberty, all while she prepares to enter high school in the fall," TLC said.
"Jazz may beknown as an author and activist, but she’s first and foremost a teenage girl with a big, brave heart, living a remarkable life,” said Nancy Daniels, TLC general manager.
The network has ordered 11 episodes of the series, produced by This Is Just A Test with executive producers Aengus James and Colin Miller. It is scheduled to premiere this summer.
“We know that families come in all shapes and sizes, but at their core, they are all about love, acceptance and support,” said Marjorie Kaplan, group president, TLC and Animal Planet, adding that the network will "tell this family’s story in a way that celebrates and demystifies difference[s] in an effort to help create a world without prejudice."
