TGM

Curious what career he would have had had he lived...

any movies you think he would've been cast in?

how many Oscars if any...

would he have been a Hollywood recluse?

do you feel any current actors benefitted from his death, meaning they would've competed for the same roles.... perhaps Brad Pitt? or Leo?

dex14

I would imagine it would've been similar to the early days of Johnny Depp. And then he probably would've gotten sick of it all and become a recluse.
I also wonder if, had he not died, Joaquin would've committed to acting as much as he did.

Hazel Motes

yeah I always thought he would have basically had what Johnny Depps career was up until Pirates. However, had River survived addiction and took on a role like Pirates, he probably would have still died from ODing. Whereas with Depp all Pirates did was turn Johnny into a major alcoholic and destroy his personal life.

Decker

Interesting that several child actors from that period were able to transition to successful lifelong acting careers at the very top. Leo, Christian Bale, Phoenix’s co-star Ethan Hawke. River was an Oscar nominee before any of them. No reason to think River wouldn’t have been in the same league.

Hokeyboy

It would have been carburetors, man. That's what it's all about.

GoldenJCJ

My first thought was that his career trajectory may have been similar to Ethan Hawke’s as well. Maybe with occasional larger films sprinkled on similar to Keanu Reeves.

At the time of his death he had a pretty good career in independent films. I can see him following that same course and then moving on to more prestigious Oscar contending films.

I could also see him becoming a decent director as well.


...Or maybe drugs would have gotten him and he would have skidded out like Robert Downey Jr. minus the redemption and career resurrection.

Drexl

His big franchise might have been taking over for Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones in a new series of films, assuming there wouldn't be much objection to recasting since he had already played him as a teenager.

JeffTheAlpaca

Would he have tried independent cinema?

He might have been one of those guys that would refuse to be typecast in a superhero or franchise tentpole.

dex14

He did.

GoldenJCJ

I’m on JeffTheAlpaca’s ignore list?

Mabuse

From looking at River’s Wikipedia page LeonDicapri was the greatest beneficiary of his death. Two projects slated for River eventually went to him.

JeffTheAlpaca

Sorry I read your comments and probably what you mentioned might have happened.

He might be working in a show available just for streaming too.

Josh-da-man

He would have played Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars prequels.

Decker

Why would you think Lucas might have hired a good actor in that part?

Decker

Leo was probably the market correction for River's death in the same way that Emma Stone was the market correction for Lindsay Lohan's drug problem and Tom Hanks was the market correction for Michael Keaton's repeated poor choices in scripts.

JeffTheAlpaca

Phoenix was probably a better actor than Leo

bluetoast

Wasn’t he obsessed with music, moreso than acting? Maybe he would have bailed on acting for a period of time to focus on that.

Shannon Nutt

I was thinking Leo as well. It's very likely he would have been both a Tarantino and Scorsese favorite, much like Leo is.

Also, it's not beyond the realm of possibility to think that Joaquin would have been a much lesser-own actor. I mean, how many brother duos achieve the same amount of success? None of the Baldwins did as well as Alec; Beau never achieved what Jeff did, etc. It's possible had River lived that Joaquin would have taken a much different career path.

Perkinsun Dzees

Judging by his taste in film projects, I think his ceiling would have been something like this:

DVD Josh

His brother is one of my favorite actors. Can do without his rambling diatribe award speeches but I will always watch his performances.

windom

He may have ended up with a career similar to Christian Slater who replaced him in Interview with the Vampire.

Side story: River Phoenix died on the day I got married. Someone signed his name in the guestbook. Or maybe his ghost was there.

Mabuse

I’ll tell my River Phoenix story. I bought Stand By Me on DVD the first day of release (which a quick google search tells me was the first week of September 2000). At that time I was living in LA and was at Tower Video pretty much every Tuesday for new releases. I bought Stand By Me and probably a couple of other titles. I walk outside and back to the parking lot behind the building, but I look up and of course there was the Viper Room just a few yards down the street. And in that moment it just felt very eerie.

Deadman31

That’s really not much of a story. What’s eerie about it? How many other people probably did the same thing that day?

Mabuse

It just didn’t connect at the moment of purchase. But when I found myself outside and realized I was just steps away from where he died, and seeing as how the film is about finding the location of a young boy who died. It was strange.

dhmac

Was River Phoenix an addict? I thought his death was due to him trying drugs offered to him by others that he was inexperienced with, hence the overdose, but he wasn't a drug addict. Am I mistaken about this?