Netflix Red Hot Chili Peppers Film to Focus on Israeli Founding Guitarist Hillel Slovak

When they performed in Israel for the first time in 2012, the band’s bassist, Flea, told the audience that Slovak “invented Israeli punk.”

By Shula Rosen

Netflix will release a documentary on March 20 examining the early formation of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and the role of founding guitarist Hillel Slovak, according to Variety. Titled The Rise of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, the film focuses on the band’s origins and Slovak’s influence. His brother, James Slovak, is listed among the executive producers.

Slovak, born in Haifa in 1962, died of a drug overdose in 1988 at 26.

His parents were Holocaust survivors who met on a kibbutz in Israel before settling in Los Angeles by way of New York. He received his first guitar for his bar mitzvah. His mother told Tablet Magazine: “Hillel used to play everywhere— in the garage, in the bedroom, even on Passover Eve. Every person who heard him play said he plays like Hendrix.”

The band’s original lineup — Anthony Kiedis, Slovak, Flea, and Jack Irons — formed after the four met as students at Fairfax High School, having first crossed paths at Bancroft Junior High.

In his memoir, Kiedis wrote of their early friendship: “I immediately knew that Hillel was at least my equal.”

“Hillel was Jewish, he looked Jewish, and talked about Jewish stuff, and the food in that kitchen was Jewish. He made us egg salad sandwiches on rye bread that day, which was totally exotic food to me then,” he recalled.

When the band performed in Israel for the first time in 2012, Flea told the audience that Slovak “invented Israeli punk.”

Screens displayed the message “Hillel, we Love You,” and Kiedis dedicated the song “Around the World” to Haifa. Flea also reflected on a trip Slovak took to Israel in his youth, saying, “He was so lit up and so excited and so full of love.”

Band members have frequently described Slovak as central to their musical direction. During the group’s induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2012, Kiedis referred to him as the band’s “heart and soul” and “architect.”