Drew Barrymore and Demi Lovato reflect on drug use in childhood

Demi Lovato and Drew Barrymore went through more as child stars than most people do in a lifetime, and now they're lamenting their troubling early experiences with drugs and alcohol.

“It's hard to say you don't blame other people when maybe others gave you drugs as a kid,” Lovato, who uses they/them pronouns, argued in the new documentary. Child starwhich she co-directed with Nicola Marsh. “How old were you when you first received a present?” she asked the ET Star.

Barrymore, who got her first acting job at 11 months, replied: “I used to get high with my mom's friend when I was 10. And I thought she was so cool and she gave me and her son weed.”

“It is difficult to not “When you're 10 years old, you blame other people,” Lovato said. But as Barrymore reflected on these dangerous and unusual aspects of her childhood, she noted, “Those were all my actions, those were my reactions. That was my coping mechanism. I'm very responsible, I don't blame other people.” The talk show host also said that having children changed her perspective on her own youth.

“To have a 10-year-old daughter now is just unbelievable to me. But that's the way I grew up,” said Barrymore.

Child star is the fourth documentary film starring Lovato, which chronicles her turbulent childhood and her life-and-death struggle to free herself from addiction and the effects of an eating disorder. But where Demi Lovato: Stay strong (2012), Demi Lovato: Simply complicated (2017) and Demi Lovato: Dancing with the devil (2021) focused exclusively on Lovato, Child star broadens the scope to consider the conditions that put child actors in such precarious, easily exploitable positions.

In addition to Barrymore, the ultimate child star of Generation X, Lovato interviews Christina Ricci, Kenan Thompson and a number of prodigies of subsequent generations, including Alyson Stoner, Jojo Siwa and Raven-Symoné. What's disturbing is that most of those interviewed said they were exposed to illegal substances by adults at some point in their childhood.

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Ricci said she “immediately turned to drugs and alcohol in her teenage years” after landing her first film role in the 1990s. Mermaids at just 10 years old. “I can't remember feeling like there was any other way to be happy,” she recalls.

“I knew I couldn't show that I was drinking, even though I was. That only made me rebel more,” Stoner recalled. Lovato added, “Finding drugs was easy. That was the only way I could think of.”

Lovato has been remarkably open about the struggles with drug and alcohol addiction they endured after being exposed to Disney series such as Sonny with a chance and films like Camp Rock. Whether it's the challenge of abstinence or the horrors of an overdose, Lovato has become an advocate for former child actors and anyone trying to break the cycle of addiction.

Barrymore has also been open about her struggle with drug addiction, which began when she was too young to seriously consent to being given anything. Barrymore has called herself a “walking cautionary tale” and admitted to being addicted to alcohol since she was 13. Now sober, she sees her struggle to stop drinking as “one of the most honorable things I can do to the Barrymore name, because we were all such hedonists,” she said of her famous acting family.

Barrymore's grandfather John died as a result of alcohol abuse, and her aunt Diana and father John Drew were also former alcoholics.

In the documentary, Stoner explained that there are “actual studies that show that people who are famous live an average of 14 years younger than non-famous people” because of the higher prevalence of both substance abuse and mental health issues. “If that's the case,” Stoner asked, “then why would we give a child a drug that fundamentally alters their brain chemistry and future development?”

Child star Ultimately, the story of addiction and survival tries to cheer people up rather than depressing them. At the end, Lovato speaks to several young actors and members of the Looking Ahead program, which campaigns for more legal protection for child actors.

“Of course you want to make a great movie or a great TV show or a great commercial,” Lovato told them. “But what matters is your own well-being and the other things in your life, like family and friends. That's what really matters.”