James Cameron is one helluva storyteller behind the camera.
That much is obvious.
But have you ever heard him tell a story so riveting that your jaw will drop? Well, that’s exactly what happened when the famed Avatar and Titanic director appeared on In Depth with Graham Bensinger.
Cameron and Bensinger discussed a myriad of topics, including Cameron recounting his most intense drug experience.
Cameron’s Colorado River Trip in the Mid-’70s
This story is wild from start to finish. As he tells it, Cameron and his first wife, Sharon, hit up the Colorado River for a camping trip. They were there with friends.
But the story’s origin actually starts the year prior.
“So, a year before, I was up there with my, my first wife Sharon, driving around in her Camaro. And we decided to go rabbit hunting as you do when you’re really bored, and in the town of Needles [in California],” Cameron began. “And so I was riding around on the hood of our car with a .22, never hit a damn thing. I was a crap shot at that point.”
Cameron later says some of the stray ammo wound up lying around in the car for about a year. The story picks up about a year later.
The Bullets Start Flying
“And then we’re back at the river, Colorado River, camping a year later. And I clean up the car for some reason, and I find this ammo, and I just shove it in like a hamburger bag,” he explains. “You know, there was just some, some fast food trash in the car. And, all right, full disclosure – then we drop acid.”
And, as one usually does after dropping acid, Cameron went on the hunt for hot dogs and buns.
“I come back, there’s a campfire going, and my wife Sharon and her friend Lisa have made a campfire,” he continues. “And so we’re all sitting there, and we’re on acid and cooking hot dogs, and the fire goes, pew!”
Yes, that’s right.
“And I go, ‘What’d you start the fire with?’ And they said, ‘Oh, some trash bags that were in the car.’ I’m like, ‘Crap!’ And I grabbed everybody, and we jumped behind the car, and then bullets start flying out of the campfire and pinging the car — got a couple bullet holes in the car,” he says. “It’s hysterical, although it could have been quite tragic. And then this other guy who must have been stoned out his mind comes walking down the road going, ‘Hey man, people are shooting at us, man.’ I’m like, ‘Well, you might want to get down then.'”
Cameron chalked it up to “s–t you do when you’re a kid,” although he admits he was just 20 years old at the time.
He called it the most intense experience with a psychedelic. He joked that he lost a ton of brain cells and that it stunted his creativity. But the truth is, he admits, that a dream he had when he was 19 years old yielded a painting that later served as the inspiration behind Avatar.
“So, it was in that kind of experimental time period,” he says. “Yeah, maybe it was helpful.”
