Profile: Cash Lamar

By Dawne Belloise

Born to Roxana Alvarez and Craig Lamar, Cash Lamar was raised in Crested Butte until ninth grade. He was avid about acting and involved in several CB Mountain Theatre productions. At six years old, Cash auditioned for a role in one of the CB Mountain Theatre’s productions, but he tells that the real influence came from his friend Essie Horne. “She convinced me to join an opera camp which was part of the CB Music Festival, and we’d perform a musical in the camp. I always enjoyed it.” He attended music camp for four years and when he was 12, he landed the part of Oliver in the CB Mountain Theatre production. “We would sing songs from Oliver in camp. I loved the sense of community that a play of that scale has. Also, it’s an ego boost,” and between that and the stage energy, it’s what sealed his passion for the art. 

Although he says CB is a paradise, he didn’t feel it was a place of opportunity for acting. Even though Crested Butte Community School (CBCS) has acting programs, it’s not geared toward a professional acting career.

Most of Cash’s maternal family hail from Cuba and emigrated to Miami and he and his mom moved to The Magic City, as it’s known. He applied to the New World School of the Arts in his sophomore year of high school, where only 20 students are accepted per program. “I was terrified. You show up and perform a monologue, either dramatic or comedic,” he recalls. Cash was called back to do the monologue again but with different directions to see if he could adapt. He aced it and began his studies there in 2019.

Miami was initially a bit of a culture shock, Cash remembers. “The amount of diversity and the way things are handled, like nobody talks to each other there. In CB I wasn’t really connected to my Cuban heritage,” he says, but living in a Cuban neighborhood he realized, “My individual culture changed because I was more exposed to it and that was a big change. The biggest thing to adapt to was the school itself,” he says of the very intense and professional school, where technically, all the acting classes were college level that took place on the Miami Dade College campus. “It was very grueling and harsh sometimes, but they pushed you to unlock your potential. I’m still deeply connected to my classmates and the faculty. It was an amazing experience.” Cash graduated in 2022. 

During COVID Cash returned to Crested Butte, taking Zoom classes online. “We decided to return to CB because of my lung issues and COVID,” he explains, since in Miami there was a lot of political friction where masks and lockdown were not taken seriously and the virus spread quickly. 

Many will remember Cash’s battle for life when he was only in second grade. He contracted a flu that developed into a stage 3 influenza and opened the door for other viruses and bacteria to invade his lungs, sending him on a Flight for Life to Children’s Hospital in Denver. He was in an induced coma for two-and-a-half months of the five months he spent in the hospital and experienced kidney failure and multiple health issues. When he came out of the coma, he was in extensive rehab, his muscles had atrophied, he couldn’t sit up or speak and he was still on life support as well as an ECMO machine that filtered and oxygenated his blood since his kidneys had failed. 

To this day, Cash’s lungs haven’t completely healed. “There’s still scar tissue and I almost had to have a lung transplant.” Miraculously, the week before the transplant operation was scheduled, his lungs spontaneously and rapidly healed enough. When Cash was finally able to come home, he fondly remembers that it was a very big day. “They had a huge parade,” he smiles. He was greeted by everyone in the community and the parade marched uptown with him being driven up Elk. It was the summer before third grade and he wore an oxygen tank through most of that school year. 

After New World School of Arts, Cash says his passion switched. “I developed a little bit of anxiety and crippling stage fright.” Suddenly he was a small fish in a big pond. “Being around people who were excellent and so professional, I was trying to push myself too hard and overthinking the whole thing. It was very much bigger than I had experienced.” Part of the curriculum involved composing monologues but Cash decidedly didn’t like his assigned characters so he would rewrite them. “They’d assign a challenging monologue and then you’d have to perform it and get critiqued by the teachers. I realized that I really liked writing.”  

With many of his colleagues in the film industry, his father being a film teacher at CBCS and his mom working for the National Film Archives in New York, Cash had more of a connection to film. “Simultaneously, I realized I was really attracted to storytelling and writing in general. I liked making up whole sequels in my head to films I saw, developing new storylines and characters,” he says. In a moment, he decided to become a filmmaker although he still wanted to do film acting. “Film and stage require different things from you. Things that push you out of your comfort zone instill personal change and develop you.”

After his New World graduation, Cash returned to CB and worked several jobs around town to raise money to continue his education. His top pick was Prague Film School. “I had a close friend from school who was making films outside of school. I would help him out technically with sound mixing, assistant directing and even camera work. He had gone to Prague the year before and told me to forget any American school, because the Prague Film School is so much cheaper and more technically hands-on than most American universities.” Cash was accepted into their program, got his visa and left the U.S. for the first time.

The Prague school was international, diverse with students from all around the world, and very selective with only 100 students accepted. Cash describes the small campus as having only two old houses for classroom buildings, but he found it entirely exciting. “Meeting new like-minded people and every one of my classmates were so cool. I felt included from the first week. We’d go to bars and parties. I felt very at home. I was super impressed by the school itself despite that it was run out of a little house. The teachers were actively in the film industry and very professional. Some of them had been nominated for Oscars. The school had amazing, state-of-the-art equipment. We were taken through every aspect, from crew work to writing. It really showed me the importance of every angle of filmmaking,” he says. “What I learned in that single year at that school was unmatched.” 

Students were given a camera and three people to complete five projects. Cash describes one example, “You had to make a one-minute short film that revolved around a bench.” Cash created a Charlie Chaplin-inspired black and white comedy about two drunk guys in a park trying to steal a bike that was chained to a bench. “In the end they take the whole bench.” The students were responsible for making the entire project on their own from writing to fundraising to casting actors and production. His final project was about an introverted loner who was romantically involved with a toaster he had personified. “Objectophilia is a real thing, although it’s rare,” he explains. Cash graduated in May of 2024, winning Best Director and Audience Choice awards. He and his girlfriend, Isabelle Jean-Baptiste, then traveled around Europe for a month before they returned to Crested Butte.

Cash is currently working at Bonez and Teocalli Tamale while planning to make another short film here. He’s also submitting his reedited projects to film festivals. “I am 100% sure I want to be a filmmaker. I want to apply to a larger university, anywhere in the world.” He feels that regardless of whether or not he goes further in college, he’s always going to make independent films. “It’s what I’m passionate about. My next focus is making connections and getting work in the film industry, trying to get my foot in the door since I am young. I want to make my first feature film by the time I’m 25,” he says of his ambition.

Cash credits his parents for his success. “They’ve sacrificed a lot to help me on my whole path and they’re actually credited as producers on some of my student films.” Meanwhile, Cash will be in Crested Butte for now, however, he doesn’t plan on staying in the valley. “I love CB but I can’t be a filmmaker here. I need to be someplace where the film industry is going. But if I do end up getting my foot in the door, I do plan on filming something larger in CB.”