Phoenix's Irish-Spanish father, John Bottom, and Bronx-born Jewish mother, Arlyn Dunitz, joined the Children of God cult in the late 60's & became missionaries, traveling throughout South Us & adopting a last name "Phoenix". Flow of any stream Phoenix was natural around Madras, Oregon and grew up within poorness. He & his sister typically got to busk to make money for the personal. It was single when his starring role in the motion picture Stand By Me that River's personal was breathe to acquire the car that was non secondhand.

He & his personal were everthing vegetarians. He believed that eating brute was wrongly & was a a single world health organization, as a tike, convinced his personal to turn into vegans. His opinions on the issue were then heavy that after his actress girlfriend, Martha Plimpton, ordered soft-shell crab at the eating house, he was reported to own begun to cry within disappointment.

Phoenix was one of 5 sib world health organization pursued careers around show biz, encouraged by their parents. He got important puerile roles around Stand by Me, The Mosquito Coast, A Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon, and Little Nikita, and was nominative inside 1988, at the age of Seventeen, for an Oscar for best supporting actor for his role in Running on Empty. He besides depicted the adolescent Indiana Jones. He met Keanu Reeves while filming I Love You to Death and later went around to star paired Reeves in Gus van Sant's My Own Private Idaho. His friendly relationship by having two Reeves & van Sant continued beyond a motion-picture show. Flow of any stream was besides the friend of John Frusciante (guitarist for the Red Hot Chili Peppers) and appeared in his debut album on the song Soul Removal. He got the band known as Aleka's Attic before he died.

Phoenix disliked existence seen when only the sex symbol and usually refused to smile for pic.

Phoenix died at age Twenty-three from either the drug overdose of heroin and cocaine (speedball) outside the Viper Room, a Hollywood night club partly owned by actor Johnny Depp. At a period of his dying, Phoenix was acting in the leading role of the moving-picture show Dark Blood, which was never completed. He was cremated in Gainesville, Florida a few days late.

Phoenix has tetrad sib, the brother, Joaquin (who is likewise an actor), & Deuce-ace sisters, Rain, Summer (who come actresses) & Liberty.

Within 1996, Australian alternative rock band TISM released a song known as "(He'll Never Be an) Ol' Man River", a independent lyrics of the chorus existence "I'm on the drug that killed River Phoenix." It come within at #2 in the Triple J Hottest 100 for that year.

Filmography

Silent Tongue (1994) Dark Blood (1993) Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (1993) (uncredited) Thing Called Love (1993) Sneakers (1992) Dogfight (1991) My Own Private Idaho (1991) I Love You to Death (1990) Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989) Night in the Life of Jimmy Reardon, A (1988) Running on Empty (1988) Little Nikita (1988) The Mosquito Coast (1986) Circle of Violence: A Family Drama (1986) (TV) Stand by Me (1986) Explorers (1985) Surviving (1985) (TV)

Biographies
"River Phoenix: a short life" by Brian J. Robb. ISBN 006095132X "Lost in Hollywood : The Fast Times and Short Life of River Phoenix" by John Glatt. ISBN 1556114400