Jenna Ortega and Cameron Boyce rose to fame on the Disney Channel around the same period and had known each other for a long time when they met up for an audition to play lovers shortly before Boyce’s death.
“The last time I saw my friend Cameron Boyce — I’d known him since I was like 11 or 12, and we were supposed to kiss [in an audition] and he knew me, since I was 11 or 12. This is a few years later, 15, 16, came in, we were supposed to be love interests,” Ortega recalled in a recent interview with French TV’s Canal+.
“But because he obviously felt weird and he was a bit older, he was like — we both just kinda looked at each other and we were like, ‘No, we can’t do this,’” she added. “And it was so sweet because I was uncomfortable and I was having a hard time… And then we wished each other well.”
Jenna talking about Cameron Boyce ❤️ pic.twitter.com/3fENFJTbdI
— Eloise 🕷️ (@cairoswife) September 10, 2024
Cameron Boyce passed away in his sleep after an epilepsy seizure in 2019. His family started annual fundraisers for The Cameron Boyce Foundation to keep his memory alive and asked fans/friends to do the same at this year’s event in June.
“All of his fans, all of his supporters, they still keep his legacy alive,” the late actor’s father, Victor, told People. “People still want to hold onto him. They don’t want him to be gone.”
Though his mother, Libby, described the Cam For A Cause event as ‘a reminder of just what a beautiful soul we birthed, but also we raised,’ she also admitted to feeling ‘bittersweet’ on Boyce’s 25th birthday this year: “It was a very hard day, but it was also a very beautiful thing to see what he meant to so many people.”
Boyce’s Disney co-stars, including Sofia Carson, China Anne McClain, and Skai Jackson, took to social media in late May to honor his memory.
