by RALUCA STATE

The psychiatrist, the detective, the bartender. For every Tom, Brad and George in the acting business, there’s a Mark Camacho backing them up with a smile. “I’m going to work until I am 150 years old,” local thespian Camacho says happily, describing the illustrious career of a character actor as opposed to a romantic lead. “When your looks fade, so does your career. Once you get slotted into that romantic lead, you are going up against the next young hottie every time, whereas if you’re a character actor, you’ll always be in the game.”

Born and raised in Montreal, the 38-year-old Soprano-esque star got in the game, as many local actors do, on the stage in Concordia’s theatre program. Fourteen years later, after several waitering gigs and a brief stint as a real estate agent, Camacho has made quite a name for himself as an onscreen everyman, somebody who can portray anybody convincingly.

Camacho’s first paying job was in a touring company’s production of Pinocchio (“I couldn’t believe I was being paid to act”) and he followed it up with a role in the feature Speed Zone, starring alongside John Candy and Eugene Levy. Since then, Camacho has successfully expanded his career to include theatre (where he took on his favourite role, Romano, in Paradise by the River), voice work in animation series such as Arthur and Animal Crackers, and screenwriting, most recently on Pursuing Faith, which he is busy shopping around.

His greatest love, however, remains acting on the big screen. “I’m really all about film,” Camacho says with a grin. “Hollywood loves Montreal and I am lucky enough to get my fair share of work.”

His share of the motion picture pie has included The Whole Nine Yards, The Score and television features like The Jackie Gleason Story and, most recently, Rudy’s Wars, where Camacho plays Tony Carbonetti, Rudy Giuliani’s Chief of Staff. The film, scheduled to air in the spring, takes place on September 11 but flashes back to pivotal moments throughout the mayor’s career. “It has actually been kind of scary. We filmed on Cathcart street and they had two cranes hoisted up several hundred feet in the air with cannons that were just exploding debris on top of our heads. We had to be running through the street and the director purposely didn’t tell us where to go, it was just like, ‘You have to escape this.’ I can only imagine what it must have been like. I mean, we know at the end of the day we’re going home. It was surreal to experience a fraction of what they may have felt on that day.” :

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