House Party makers reflect on making the cult hip‑hop film and its impact

Reginald Hudlin and performers Christopher “Kid” Reid and Christopher “Play” Martin have been looking back on the making of the cult hip‑hop film House Party, which began as a short Hudlin wrote while he was at Harvard. Hudlin said Black music videos were not played on MTV in the late 1980s and that, inspired by Luther Vandross’s Bad Boy/Having a Party, he wrote a student short that was shown at festivals and became a big hit in the world of student films.

Spike Lee’s She’s Gotta Have It, he added, had piqued interest in up‑and‑coming Black filmmakers; New Line Cinema saw his short, brought him in and agreed to expand it. The studio wanted Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, Hudlin recalled, but he pushed for Kid ’n Play and had to convince New Line, saying: “They’ve got platinum records,” though he admitted he did not know if they did.

Hudlin said the feature kept everything from the student film while building the world and characters, and that it captured a specific moment in hip‑hop just before gangsta rap. He also said the film addressed safe sex in a playful way – “We’re gonna hide this,” he said, “like when you have to give your dog a pill so wrap it in bacon” – and that they later won an award from a New Jersey health clinic whose staff said: “Kids come in, ask for condoms and reference your film.” Play recalled that Kid ’n Play’s first album, 2 Hype, came out in 1988 and that Hudlin wanted them because of their animated music videos.

Key Topics

Culture, House Party, Reginald Hudlin, Kid 'n Play, New Line Cinema, Harvard