Getty Image / Tiffany Burke/IndieWire/istock/Mikheili Kochiashvili
Actress Alicia Silverstone, best known for Clueless and appearances in Aerosmith’s music videos for ‘Cryin’ and ‘Crazy’, sparked concern from her fans over the past 24 hours when she shared a video of herself eating what appears to be a poisonous fruit. She has since gone radio silent.
In the video, Alicia wrote “What the heck is this!? I’m in England and can’t figure it out.” in the caption and can be seen talking about the small fruit. It looks very similar to a small tomato. But she had just plucked it off of a bush in some random person’s garden and then took a bite.
PSA: do NOT eat random fruits or berries without knowing what you are eating. THIS IS HOW OUR CAVEMEN ANCESTORS DIED.
In the video, Silverstone can be heard saying “I’ve discovered something that I can’t figure out what it is and I need your help. I just bit into it because it was on the street and we were discussing whether this was tomato or no.” At no point did it seem to cross her mind that she shouldn’t be plucking random fruits off plants and eating them without knowing what she was putting into her body.
After taking a bite, she agreed “it’s definitely not” a tomato. And as it turns out, anyone and everyone who has seen the video is convinced she took a bite out of a toxic Jerusalem cherry fruit which, thankfully for Alicia Silverstone, is not deadly.
However, it can cause extreme gastrointestinal distress leading to vomiting and diarrhea which may or may not explain the current radio silence from Silverstone after posting that video less than 24 hours ago.
The video, posted to Instagram and TikTok, has also gone viral on X where thousands of posts have been shared questioning Alicia Silverstone eating a toxic fruit. One post has even been viewed 5.7+ million times in the past 24 hours:
this tiktok of a confused alicia silverstone eating a fruit off a bush from someone’s front yard in london blissfully unaware that it’s actually a very poisonous form of deadly nightshade has absolutely killed me. she’s not posted since either rip girl you were great in clueless pic.twitter.com/ozdnL0RvC5
— joshua 🍒 (@joshcharles_21) August 20, 2024
Pretty much every reply on TikTok and Instagram are from people either (A) pointing out that what she ate is the toxic Jerusalem cherry fruit which isn’t deadly to humans but might be to cats and/or (B) fans of Alicia Silverstone’s asking her to check in because nobody has heard from her since she took a bite out of a random toxic fruit growing in someone’s yard.
What is the Jerusalem cherry fruit that Alicia Silverstone appeared to eat?
Jerusalem cherry fruit, also known as Solanum pseudocapsicum, is “a nightshade species with mildly poisonous fruit.” It is native to Peru and Ecuador but found in England because it is very resistant to cold winters.
For anyone who wants to learn more, there’s a lengthy Wiki entry on related plants and its history in pop culture.
I repeat: DO NOT EAT FRUITS OR BERRIES WITHOUT KNOWING WHAT THEY ARE.