IF YOU WATCHED Mindhunter and didn’t find yourself totally and utterly unsettled by Cameron Britton’s portrayal of serial killer Ed Kemper, count yourself in the minority.
He was terrifying; plain and simple.
Indeed, Cameron’s role in the hit Netflix show has earned him an Emmy nomination – the only one awarded to David Fincher’s 10-part crime drama.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter, Cameron gave an insight into the process that goes into portraying a man responsible for the deaths of at least ten women.
Acknowledging that some performers do their level best to ‘honour’ their subject, Cameron thought this would be inappropriate given the nature of his subject’s crimes.
If I was trying to honor anybody it would be the victims, to give an accurate account of what they went through with this guy.
And oftentimes – if the opportunity presents itself – an actor will meet with the person they will be portraying, but this is not a path Cameron wanted to go down.
I didn’t have any interest in meeting him. I didn’t want to go on a personal level. I just don’t want to meet someone who’s murdered a bunch of women. You know, I just would never want to meet someone like that.
The 32-year-old also feared that a meeting might thrill Kemper – something Cameron didn’t want to encourage.
Perhaps he would enjoy if I came to meet him? Perhaps he would find that as a feather in a cap? And if that were the case, then I most certainly don’t want to meet him.
While Cameron’s portrayal of the man has been lauded, he insists that he’s doing less of an impression and more of an interpretation in order to avoid a macabre tribute.
Elaborating on this, he told THR about the crew’s direction during the audition process.
Even in the auditions we discussed not focusing on doing an impression of him, not paying homage, because that’s not what this is about. I found a lot of letters written to him from, I guess you’d call them fans? All of his stuff, and all of this baffles me. It almost feels like a lot of folks are encouraging this kind of behavior.
This is Cameron’s first Emmy nomination.
