Cameron Bender Describes Riding The Waves Of Life
“I like bad movies a lot!” Cameron Bender admits about his love for movies that don’t have happy endings and in which the characters encounter very difficult struggles. “It’s just like life,” says the 36-year-old actor, who has the energy of a teenager on red bull, and the aspirations of a young child not yet placed in the ‘real world.’ “L.A. can keep you super young,” he says. But I have a feeling Cameron would be the same anywhere he goes. From our chat over coffee, I can tell you Cameron’s energy is infectious, his passion for entertainment is powerful, and his desires to tell unusually great stories is clearly influential. This rising power will explode any day now. Cameron laughs and says, “I’m on my 15 year plan to become an over night success. And I’m right on schedule, I’m right there!”
Fourteen years ago, Cameron made the journey from his home state of Michigan out to Hollywood to pursue his dream of becoming an actor. “I went to school for journalism to be a sports journalist, because I wanted to go to games for free. But then I realized I’d be working,” he says with a little laugh, emphasizing the word “working” and adds that it might have ruined the shine of sports from a fan’s perspective. That was a game-changer for Cameron. So, he dropped his journalism class after one day and realized acting was the path for him. “That’s all I really wanted to do,” he says.
David Campbell, an actor from “a bunch of old dead movies and a really cool guy,” Cameron says, gave him some advice before he moved Cali. “I met him before I came out to L.A. and told him I was going to be an actor, and he said ‘I’m sorry,’” Cameron shares. “I thought he was being a jerk, but he totally wasn’t, he was sincerely apologetic that that’s what my calling was.” And it’s really tough, Cameron adds, being an actor can be unfulfilling most of the time. “I tell actors that if they are moving out here, don’t give yourself a backup plan…because you will fall back to it.”
Cameron goes on to use one of his cleverly-descriptive analogies, “I used to say I was dating my career and she was such a frigid witch that I only got bits and pieces of joy, but they were just enough to keep me around, and the rest of it was just drudgery,” he says in all seriousness, and then lets out a small chuckle. Cameron started work as a production assistant when he first arrived in Hollywood, “which is more soul-crushing and life-sucking than any other thing you can do out here…but I was on set all the time.”
Cameron has left his P.A. days far behind, and with no regrets says he is at a very joyful place in life. He is working on several projects at once. He just brought his family black lab, Jules (named after Jules Vern) out, and he lives with three inspiring roommates in the thick of the entertainment capital. “Right not I’m just riding this high, this crest of the wave…not fretting when it’s going to ebb again.”
“My dream has always been to tell stories with my friends, people that I love to work with. I’m already doing that. I’m working on short films and web series. So I guess I’m already successful with the goals I’ve set out for myself,” Cameron says with a smile, and then laughs; “Now I just need to make some money so I can live a little longer!”
Cameron laughs again, “I know this is weird to quote Ben Affleck, I don’t usually do that, but he did have a really good point. I read an article where he said, ‘The struggle was the fun part.’” Cameron explains, “I’ve struggled for 14 years, but it’s been such a blast and I don’t regret any of it.” Cameron, who surrounds himself with really creative and enthusiastic people all the time (like himself), says that in that process he has found people he wants to work with for the rest of his life.
One of his recent projects has been working as a creative producer, as well as director, actor, craft services, wardrobe and more, for a web series. It started from nothing, just helping out a friend, he says, but now they have brought on writers and plan to shoot in a couple weeks. “I’ve learned so much about how to be a producer,” Cameron says who has also “gained confidence” in writing three scripts for the show. “It’s not for my acting,” he says. Even though he is a character in the series, he describes how he is willing to give up his part if they can find someone else who could do it better. One of his goals is to be a producer and own his own production company.
He also directed five episodes of a comedy web series titled Children’s Outreach Crew. “That was a really fun experience…Being a P.A. you always think, well I can do that way better than this director. And I finally got to do it,” he says, “And I could, I did it better than 90% of the directors I met.”
Besides his shorts and web series, Cameron has a couple national commercials running right now. One took him to Prague to work on a pretty awesome PlayStation ad that has gone super viral. “Gamers went insane!” Cameron says about the ad that now has over ten million hits on YouTube.
Also, look out for Cameron on the TV series Goodnight Burbank and in an episode of Whitney, plus many, many more projects that lie ahead for him including more sci-fi-type shorts. “After a while you start realizing that it’s one thing to be ready for the door to open, but it’s another thing to make your own door. So that’s what I’ve been doing.”
Written By: Rachel Shapiro
