Soleil Moon Frye on sexual assault in new Hulu documentary

While many know Soleil Moon Frye as the carefree character she played on TV, Punky Brewster, the actress herself has gone through some difficult times in her 44 years.

In his new documentary “Kid ’90” – created from his huge personal collection of home movies, diaries, old answering machine messages and photos from his youth – Frye opens up about a sexual assault case in detail.

In a diary entry from when she was 17 or 18, Frye wrote that a man she was dating “got into me” after she said she wasn’t ready to have sex. She pushed him away and he left the room, before asking her, “How does it feel to be no longer a virgin?” Soleil said he also wondered if she would say he raped her. Frye said no, he never told his family what happened and just “locked it” until now.

The documentary also includes an audio confrontation between Frye and another man, where she wonders how she passed out after drinking ginger ale. While she only remembers the man trying to kiss her, he calls her an aggressor and swears that nothing happened. Later, she came to believe that someone put GHB in her drink.

When asked if she knew that that entry in the diary about her assault would come when she decided to look back, Frye told TooFab that, no, she didn’t.

“I had bits and pieces of memories, but I really hadn’t looked back to those experiences – and it wasn’t just an experience, it was a lot of experiences I’m still thinking about,” she explained. “And unlocking the tapes and finding those moments where these different experiences happened that were so painful and then the diaries … was unlocking a lot of those painful experiences.”

“So, by unlocking joy, bliss and love, I was also confronting some of those parts of my life that I had just blocked,” she continued. “For me, it wasn’t about who and what. It was really about the forgiveness of the girl who was somehow holding on to it and felt like she had to lock it up forever.”

While she hopes that her openness will lead to important conversations about consent for those who watch at home, Frye said that revisiting her past trauma for the documentary also helped to talk to her own children. She is the mother of four children, whose ages range from 4 to 15 years.

“They were a great inspiration to me through all of this. They did research for me on the document and one of them filmed many parts of it,” she said of her children.

“They were really a part of the whole experience and opened up conversations so that we could talk openly,” she continued. “I can only speak from experience, but for me with my children, I really wanted to be able to have honest lines of communication and I hope that somehow it can show them who their mother was and how it relates to them and their lives and, hopefully, to connect with other people. “

“My hope is that when people watch this documentary, they are watching it through the lens of their own lives and not just through my life,” she added.

In the document, she describes how Charlie Sheen was her first consensual sexual experience, writing that it was when she lost her virginity. “He was my first, who knew?” she wrote in a diary. “It was the strangest and most incredible day ever. I really don’t know how to explain my feelings, he is someone I have a crush on for years. He is someone who intrigues and excites me.”

Frye told TooFab that she initially entered the documentary just wondering “if things went the way I remembered” – and she had no idea she was also “opening Pandora’s box”.

“It was only about four years ago … that I started to unlock the safe,” she added. “And I didn’t intend the documentary to be about me. I really was so focused on doing it about everyone but me. And then, in the end, it became a maturing story for the teen and adult self. “

“Kid ’90” is on Hulu now.

The National Sexual Assault Telephone Hotline – 800.656.HOPE (4673) – offers free support 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, for those in need.