When Belmont Cameli stepped into the skates of Off Campus’s Garrett Graham, he relied on Elle Kennedy’s novel of the same name more as guidance than scripture. He swapped literary Garrett’s penchant for Led Zeppelin with Arcade Fire (“That’s my version of the taste Garrett has,” he says), softening the literary character’s boisterous edges, concocting an all-too-easy-to-love student athlete with a true lived-in warmth.

In his conversation with Grammy Award-winning singer-songwriter Laufey, it becomes increasingly clear what pumps the blood through Garrett’s beating heart: Cameli himself. Many fans first met the charismatic actor in 2020’s Saved by the Bell remake, but lacing up skates for Prime Video this year really plugged him into fancams and TikTok FYPs (including Laufey’s) globally. Amid his shooting schedule for Off Campus’s hotly awaited second season, Cameli sat down with Laufey to chat about Joshua Tree, ballet, and the necessity of leaning into fear.

LAUFEY: I feel like I’ve been watching your star rise in the past few months, and it’s always so exciting to see artists, especially of different mediums, have their moment. And this is so, so deserved. 

BELMONT CAMELI: Yeah, for me too, watching you come up was probably the same feeling.

L: I’m so excited to talk to you, because we met before. I feel like I ran into you one time at a party or something, or I feel like you were with your mom.

BC: I think we ran into each other at the Melrose Flea or like the Silver Lake Flea—at a flea market.

L: That does check out. So are you still living in LA?

BC: Not really. I was in Laurel Canyon for a while, and then I moved out last fall, and now I don’t really have a lease anywhere. I’ve just been kind of bouncing around, but I spend the summers here in Vancouver, which is nice. 

L: You’ve been filming [Off Campus] in Vancouver, right?

BC: Yeah, so we’re here for five months during the summers, and then I just kind of bounce around—mostly New York and LA—when I’m not working.

L: Where do you go when you want to unwind? I definitely have that one place that I go to, and I just want to reset and forget about the industry.

BC: Home definitely does that for me. When I’m in LA, it’s Joshua Tree. I usually make a point to go out there a couple of times a year with a small group of friends. I like to get, like, a shitty Airbnb, ideally with a bunch of desert garbage kind of around because that’s a theme out there. That’s my retreat, and then I also go to Mount Baldy, which is an hour east of L.A. It’s a really quite high summit, and there’s this little lodge, Mount Baldy Lodge, that’s kind of trapped in the ’70s, and it’s really a great drive. It’s a great hike, and it’s just a nice place to get away.

L: I hear from a lot of people that when they go to Joshua Treats, it’s a very spiritual experience. Do you feel a connection with a higher power there? I don’t know.

BC: There’s something about the sound of the desert. It’s so quiet out there, and the echo is so pronounced. You can have a conversation in a normal normal talking volume with somebody who’s super far away. Sound just travels differently in the desert. I’ve certainly had some spiritual experiences out there. 

L: I think especially when you’re an artist, having that go-to where you know you can connect to something beyond is very [important]. It’s a little woo woo, but I kind of love it. 

So, my next question. You are truly the man of the moment right now, and I feel like all my friends are talking about you, and you’re all over my FYP and everything.

BC: God…

L: And I was just wondering how you’re doing?

BC: I think for me, it’s weird to say that I feel cut out for it because it’s certainly been weird and hard in certain cases, just because of this sudden nature of it. It’s not that I was ever hoping to be famous, but I always wanted to have success in this career and understood that that would be a facet or symptom of the work. The biggest thing that’s changed for me has been that the number on the app on my phone has gone up. You know what I mean? But my reality is that the things I can see with my eyes are all exactly the same. I’ve always been extremely wary to digest that type of hype. It’s been a bit of an adjustment. I think the biggest thing I’ve noticed is—like, I was in New York last weekend, and one of my favorite things to do is just walk all day long, go get 15,000 steps, and that was a little more challenging. Honestly, I had a kind of sad moment resigning to that anonymity after a day spent out in New York of like, ‘Oh man, I can’t just enjoy the solitude of being in a big world as much as I used to.’ But people are always really nice; they enjoy the thing that I’ve worked really hard on. So that’s really sweet. I still feel very much like the same person, and the best part is now I’ll hopefully have some more opportunities on the other side of this, which is what I care about: the work.

L: It seems like you have a healthy outlook on it and a good head on your shoulders.

BC: I’m not on the internet like that, which is super helpful. 

L: I haven’t had Twitter for years.

BC: It’s terrible. I think when people say something nice, if that makes you feel good, then people have this same power to make you feel bad when they say something mean and rude. So I try not to ingest either.

L: What I’ve been thinking a lot about this year is how I’ve done all these tours and written this music, and I know what it’s like to do these things, so I want to try things that scare me a little bit. I was like, ‘Should I jump out of a plane?’ But then I was like, ‘I really don’t want to jump out of a plane.’ Does anything scare you?

BC: Oh my god, all the time. But that’s kind of my favorite. A lot of the greatest growth I’ve achieved as a person and an artist has been on the other side of things that scared me the most. My instrument is my brain and my body. That’s what I had to continually fine-tune, and that’s a never-ending process. The more life experience I have, the more I have to pull from, and having a range of experiences is really important. So I never neglect things that scare me. Those are the most essential parts of life. When I can apply those to the work, that’s where the fulfillment comes from. But yeah, I’ve done a lot of things that scare me—leaving school in the first place to become an actor was kind of horrifying. But it’s no fun to do something that isn’t challenging.

L: I heard that on top of being an actor, you are also a filmmaker, and that’s something you want to be a part of your journey. What inspires you? What kind of stories do you want to tell? 

BC: There’s a lot I want to do right now. I’m focused on building out my body of work as an actor, but I can’t wait to direct. When I write, comedy flows from me the most naturally, so I look forward to working on comedy. I’ve always been a big fan of both blockbuster comedies and niche, offbeat comedies.

L: There hasn’t been enough of that in the past couple of years. So you’ll bring that back. 

BC: I completely agree. I mean, that was the heartbeat of my fan experience as a kid, all these big Steve Carell, Will Ferrell, and Jim Carrey [movies]. I agree there could and should be more of them. I love comedy. It’s my favorite. I grew up as a student of Robin Williams, David Letterman, and these comedy legends. Norm Macdonald was one of my favorite standups. These people I revere. I also really want to write a drama about ballet because my sister was a ballerina, and I’ve always been appreciative of that art form as an audience member. It would be a great challenge athletically. I’ve gotten to play different types of athletes now, and I think it would be really fulfilling. The things they do in their movement and as athletes are fascinating. The life of a ballerina is usually pretty unglamorous and very difficult, so that’s a story I would love to tell someday. We’ll see.

L: That’s super cool. If you need someone to score it or work on music, you know exactly who to call now.

BC: It would be a perfect pairing for the story.

This cover story appears in the pages of VMAN 57: now available for purchase!

Photography Luigi & Iango

Interview LAUFEY

Fashion Hunter Clem

Creative Director / Editor-in-Chief Stephen Gan

Grooming Amy Komorowski (The Wall Group) using CIRCA 1970

Casting Greg Krelenstein (GK-LD)

Tailor Abel Martirosyan

Editor Kev Ponce

Art Director Clément Condat 

Fashion Market Editor Gabby Buchan

Producer Louis Guillemain (2b Management)

Luigi & Iango Studio Manager Francisco Betancourt

Photo Assistant Francisco Betancourt

Styling Assistant Arut Arustamyan

Production Assistant Juliet Lloyd

Cinematographer Santiago Montes