River Phoenix
River Jude Phoenix (née Bottom; August 23, 1970 – October 31, 1993) was an American actor, musician, and activist.
Phoenix grew up in an itinerant family, as the oldest brother of Rain Phoenix, Joaquin Phoenix, Liberty Phoenix, and Summer Phoenix. He had no formal schooling, but he showed an instinctive talent for the guitar, and he played and sang on the streets for money. He began his acting career at age 10 in a handful of television commercials. He starred in the science fiction adventure film Explorers (1985) and had his breakthrough role in 1986's Stand by Me, a coming-of-age film based on the novella The Body by Stephen King.
Phoenix made a transition into more adult-oriented roles with Running on Empty (1988), playing Danny Pope, the son of fugitive parents in a well-received performance that earned him a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor (at age 18, he became the sixth-youngest nominee in the category), and My Own Private Idaho (1991), playing Michael Waters, a gay hustler in search of his estranged mother. For his performance in the latter, Phoenix garnered enormous praise and won a Volpi Cup for Best Actor at the 1991 Venice Film Festival as well as Independent Spirit Award for Best Male Lead and National Society of Film Critics Award for Best Actor, becoming the second-youngest winner of the former.
Phoenix fought heroin addiction and died at age 23 from combined drug intoxication in West Hollywood in the early hours of Halloween, 1993, after unknowingly ingesting cocaine and heroin (a mixture commonly known as a speedball) at The Viper Room.
Photos
Movies (33)
Butthole Surfers: The Hole Truth and Nothing Butt
2026 · Self (archive footage)
Joaquin Phoenix: An Actor of Extremes
2024 · Self - Actor (archive footage)
Timeless Heroes: Indiana Jones and Harrison Ford
2023 · Self (archive footage)
Los niños de Hollywood
2020 · Self
Dark Blood
2012 · Boy
My Own Private River
2012 · Michael "Mike" Waters (archive footage)
Final 24: River Phoenix
2006 · Self (archive footage)
The Phoenix Portal
2005 · Wolfgang Müller / Michael "Mike" Waters (archive footage)
Indiana Jones: Making the Trilogy
2003 · Self (archive footage)
101 Most Shocking Moments in Entertainment
2003 · Self (archive footage)
The Making of ‘Sneakers’
2003 · Self
Walking the Tracks: The Summer of Stand by Me
2000 · Self (archive footage)
This Road Will Never End
1996 · Self (archive footage)
Interview with the Vampire
1994 · In Memory Of
Silent Tongue
1994 · Talbot Roe
Truth or Dairy
1994 · Self (archive footage)
The Thing Called Love
1993 · James Wright
Sneakers
1992 · Carl
Flea Master Session
1992 · Self
Dogfight
1991 · Eddie Birdlace
My Own Private Idaho
1991 · Mike Waters
Evolution's End?
1991 · Self
I Love You to Death
1990 · Devo Nod
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
1989 · Young Indy
Running on Empty
1988 · Danny Pope
Little Nikita
1988 · Jeff Grant
A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon
1988 · Jimmy Reardon
The Mosquito Coast
1986 · Charlie Fox
Circle of Violence: A Family Drama
1986 · Chris Benfield
Stand by Me
1986 · Chris Chambers
Explorers
1985 · Wolfgang Müller
Surviving
1985 · Philip Brogan
Backwards: The Riddle of Dyslexia
1984 · Brian Ellsworth
