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NOE CAMERON

(pronounced like yes, but no)

ACTOR • FILMMAKER • CONTENT CREATOR

book noë cameron

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MORE THAN AN ABOUT _ SCROLL

MORE THAN "ABOUT"

"Do you think you will act forever?"

n the pocket of time after school ended and before rehearsal began, I was aimlessly drifting on the high school stage with my theatre friends — probably laughing at some immature joke one of us had spat out.

"No. I'm going to major in engineering," my friend answered the others' question.

"Yeah, I think business for me," another responded.

Bits of black paint had chipped away from the flooring, revealing the pale Douglas fir beneath it. I don't think I had noticed this before.

"What about you, Noe?"

"Hmm?" I looked out to the theatre. 387 empty seats stared back at me.

"Do you think you will act forever?"

"Yes," I said, without hesitation.

The memory of a standing ovation. The thunderous applause of a sold-out show from earlier in the year flooded my mind.

"Why?"

"Because when I act, I get put on someone else's problems, someone else's worries, their life. For the time I'm on this stage, time doesn't exist and neither do I."

I

Noe Cameron Modeling. Gregoire Lartigue photographer

PHOTOGRAPHER: GREGORIE LARTIGUE

Noe Cameron acting on stage in high school. Theatre

Actor Noe Cameron as a child playing in snow.

Woah.

That's a lot for a 16-year-old to say. What could a child -- who had experienced so little of the world -- possibly understand about something as fundamental as the human experience? Well.

I grew up in a small town in Georgia. Thirty minutes from everything that mattered. We got our watermelon from family down the road and drove 45 minutes to the nearest Kohl's, where my mom expertly calculated what percentage to put on which card and how much Kohl's cash we would need to get most of it for free.

My father died when I was five. Under my uncle's guidance, my mom put me in Tae Kwon Do, where I spent every day after school. I made it to 3rd Dan and was set to become the youngest master in the country at sixteen. I'm an international, national, and state champion, and I've got the broken nose to prove it.

I was nearly a straight-A student. I took Latin (and it shows; give me a conversation window and I will break down the myth of Icarus like it's nothing). I did track and field, pole vaulting, and competition cheerleading (until I fractured my ankle and neck). I was a part of DECA, Student Government, NHS, and a million other clubs.

But, of course, it was all so I could stay away from home.

Her love of liquor eased her pain, but fortified mine. Some nights I would cover her with a blanket as she was passed out on the couch. Others, she'd come into my room -- waking me by ripping my blanket off in a rage. Her other hand would entwine itself in my hair, at the base of my skull, and pull until I was on the ground.

I won't recount my laundry list of traumas to you here. I have to leave some mystique after all. But, just know it was bad. So bad I thought I only had one means of escape.

As I was writing and brainstorming the best way to leave my existence here on earth, I heard a voice. In my head. That wasn't my own. Some would call this a trauma-induced auditory hallucination. Others would call this Divine Intervention.

I think Viola Davis said it best in her memoir, Finding Me: "God was asking me to be a leader in the place I felt a victim." And I don't know about y'all, but when I heard a voice with the gravity of Morgan Freeman's echo in my head, I'm going to shut up and listen.

So I burned the letter.

And if y'all think that was the end of my character-building arc, you would be mistaken. I don't think you're ready for the entire laundry list, but I'll give you a taste.

On December 23, 2019, my mother began a domino effect with her death. Over the next six years, I've gotten close with Death; starting in a dance and turning into the softest brush of lips, nearly a kiss. Twice.

Enough with the metaphors. Got it. All of my immediate family has passed and I, myself, have had two Near Death Experiences. Hypothermia and anaphylaxis.

But in between all that darkness, I moved to Los Angeles and have filled my days with giving friends and thrilling adventures. I'm even a co-founder for a digital sketch group, WE NEED A LAUGH, something I never thought I would do.

One morning, when dawn crawled across the sky in streaks of pink, I was driving through the winding Santa Monica Mountains on the way to set. I was taken back by the beauty of it all and hit with the stark realisation that I'm living a life more fully than either one of my parents got to live.

Despite what I’ve lived through, I’m learning to love myself freely and honestly. More importantly, I’m living the very ethos I believe I’m here to show others: you can be more than the circumstances you were given. But you have to choose it. Every single day. And you have to learn to love the life you are building.

Actress Noe Cameron with her mom as a child.

Actress Noe Cameron with the cast and crew of Great Job News.

At first, I loved acting because I could escape from my own life. Then, I loved it because I could be a conduit for the audience — I could show them parts of themselves they had never seen before. And now, when I act, I become myself — every iteration that has existed, and every version yet to come.