At some point, the party has to end. Club Kid asks what happens when you’re the last person to realize it.
Writer-director Jordan Firstman stars as Peter, a New York club promoter who has somehow made it well into adulthood without actually growing up. Drugs, partying and questionable decisions remain part of his everyday life, even as the career he built begins slipping away. Then, Peter discovers he has a 10-year-old son, Arlo (Reggie Absolom), and suddenly there’s someone in his life who needs him to get his shit together.
It sounds like the setup for a conventional “man-child learns responsibility” comedy, but Firstman gives it a distinctly queer and surprisingly tender identity. Peter’s world is populated by gay and trans friends who aren’t treated as obstacles to adulthood. Instead, Club Kid understands that growing up doesn’t mean abandoning your community or becoming boring—it means figuring out when the lifestyle you once loved is no longer enough.
Firstman is wonderfully messy as Peter, but young Reggie Absolom is the film’s secret weapon, giving Arlo enough personality and vulnerability to make their developing relationship genuinely affecting. The supporting cast is stacked too, with Cara Delevingne, Diego Calva and Kirby Howell-Baptiste among the recognizable faces.
Even as someone from Gen Z, this really spoke to me. There’s something particularly Millennial about watching the freedom of your twenties collide with the realization that eventually you have to build an actual life.
Club Kid is funny, chaotic and unexpectedly heartfelt, a coming-of-age movie for someone who probably should have come of age years ago.
And maybe growing up isn’t the death of the party. Maybe it’s just knowing when to go home.
Club Kid is playing at TIFF ’26. For more information, click here.
