Kid 90 is a nostalgic look at the 90’s from Punky Brewster star Soleil Moon Frye. Frye grew up among a group of famous kids in Hollywood. In her teens she recorded everything in diaries and on videotape. Her documentary using this material is streaming on Hulu.
For Kid 90, Soleil Moon Frye dug through old videos, old photos, old diary entries, and even old voice mail recordings to put together this look at her life in the 90s. Now, 30 years later, she sees things she was too immature to grasp back then.
Especially moving is her look at the number of her friends who died by their own hands when fame was too hard for them to deal with. Soleil credits her parents for always making her feel secure and loved, but not all celebrity kids had such good luck.
Many of her friends who are still around, such as Stephen Dorff, were willing to talk on camera about those times. That includes Balthazar Getty, David Arquette, Mark-Paul Gosselaar, Brian Austin Green, and others. She did have mostly male friends, although there was an occasional glimpse of a girl friend among the material shown.
The footage of the past was a quick-look collage showing a mix of hand held videos, a few photos, and some voice mails (the ones from Charlie Sheen were priceless). There were drugs, drinking, fast cars. There were friends, boyfriends, parties, and the dark side of loneliness and pain among some of these famous youngsters.
The film went from talking heads among current times to frenetic glimpses into the past. It was a little wild, but what she was describing was a little wild. The friends who are still working actors and talked on camera were as taken by Soleil’s collection of material as we are as viewers looking in on this famous childhood.
Soleil Moon Frye herself directed. She’s starring in a new film, now in post-production, which may have something to do with why she decided to tell all at this point in her life.
Here’s the trailer.