Actor / Director Profile

"Tall in the saddle" is certainly one easy way of describing (and perhaps pigeon-holing) leathery, wiry-framed 40s and early 50s western film star Rod Cameron, although he proved quite capable in crime stories, horrors and even swing-era musicals. The six-foot-four-inch native Canadian was born Nathan Roderick Cox on December 7, 1910, and raised in Alberta. Once his aspirations of becoming a Royal Canadian Mountie passed, he decided to seek fame and fortune as an actor in New York and initially grabbed some work as a laborer on the Holland Tunnel project in Manhattan. When no progress was made acting wise, he moved to California where he made his "debut" in an unbilled bit in one of Bette Davis' scenes in The Old Maid (1939). Upon release, however, he discovered his bit in the scene had been deleted.Cameron found a slight "in" (as in "stand-in") with Paramount Studios for such stars as Fred MacMurray while managing to find himself sparingly used in other Paramount films as well. To supplement his income he also played leading man in the studio's screen tests for starlet wannabes and his athleticism paid off playing stunt double for such established cowboy icons as Buck Jones. Cameron toiled as a bit player for quite awhile and appeared insignificantly in such classics as Christmas in July (1940) and North West Mounted Police (1940) (where he fulfilled his wish playing a mountie!). Occasionally he would find a noticeable secondary role in such lesser films as The Monster and the Girl (1941), The Forest Rangers (1942) and as Jesse James in The Remarkable Andrew (1942).1943 became Cameron's banner year when he finally broke out of the minor leagues and into the major ranks. His breakout screen role was as clench-jawed WWII Agent Rex Bennett, out to bring down the foreign enemy and save the world, in the Republic serial cliffhangers G-men vs. the Black Dragon (1943) and Secret Service in Darkest Africa (1943). From there he was signed by Universal to appear in a flurry of lowbudget westerns with Fuzzy Knight as his comic sidekick. Aside from the roughhewn heroics he was paid to display, he would occasionally show a softer side for the ladies such as with fellow Canadian Yvonne De Carlo in Salome Where She Danced (1945), Frontier Gal (1945) and River Lady (1948). Seldom would he delve outside the action genre, however, such as his symphony conductor in _Swing Out, Sister (1945). For the most part he remained rooted in westerns and the only variance within that realm was the occasional black-outfitted bad guy, one of whom squared off with hero George Montgomery in Belle Starr's Daughter (1948). Among Cameron's many dusty showcases (more often than not made at Republic or Universal), Brimstone (1949), Stampede (1949), Dakota Lil (1950) and San Antone (1953) are worth a good look. Cameron never found his Stagecoach (1939) or Shane (1953), some vehicle that might have held him even "taller" in the saddle., but between the years 1953 and 1955, he was still ranked "top 5" box-office.In the 1950s Cameron found time for a couple of syndicated TV series to settle into. Both "City Detective" (1953) and "State Trooper" (1956) lasted a couple of seasons. He also guested on the more popular western series -- "Bonanza," "Laramie" and "The Virginian". When his movie career began to slip away in the early 1960s, he went and filmed in Spain a couple of times and appeared in a few lowbudget western films such as Requiem for a Gunfighter (1965) and The Bounty Killer (1965) which was noticed more for reuniting sagebrush stars from yesteryear than for its high quality. He also playing an aging rodeo star who dies early in the story in the biopic Evel Knievel (1971).Cameron had suffered from an extended illness (cancer) by the time of his death in 1983 in a Gainesville, Georgia hospital at age 72. The only serious tabloid scandal he ever found himself in was when he divorced wife Angela Alves-Lico (1950-1960) and immediately married his ex-wife's mother, Dorothy, who was a few years older than Cameron. Other than that the well-liked actor's slate remained purty durn clean.