We recently connected with Benjamin McFadden and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Benjamin, thanks for joining us today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.
I started acting when I was ten years old and signed with my first commercial agent at eleven. For the majority of my life, I have loved performing in front of an audience. It has been the fuel that feeds my soul and rarely have I considered other life options. After graduating from Cornish with a BFA in theater, I spent the better part of a decade working as a professional actor; primarily on stages in the Pacific Northwest. When I moved to Los Angeles in early 2017, my goals were to make the pivot from stage to screen with all the opportunities that being a “LA actor” bring. And though I have found some small successes since being here. (A few television credits and some work as a performance capture artist.) What I was ultimately left with was a bit of a hollow experience. I missed the work in the theater and the community that comes with it. I saw all these theaters across the LA area producing but I felt the lack of cohesion. Theater is the pinnacle of creative collaboration. Not just a collaboration with other artists, but with the audience. The energy shared and transferred when telling a story collectively is unmatched. So that’s when I decided to bring 14/48: The World’s Quickest Theater Festival to Hollywood with the mission to build accessible theater within a theater community.
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
I am a theater producer, director and general practitioner. I am the founding Artistic Director of 14/48 Hollywood: The World’s Quickest Theater Festival (1448hollywood.org) and I am currently directing my adaptation of H.G. Wells’ The Time Machine for the Hollywood Fringe. I think really, when it comes down to it, I love theater. I think theater is truly a place of magic and mystery. It’s one of those things that just comes together with what feels like chewing gum and elbow grease, but when it hums at that higher frequency… It’s a shared storytelling experience beyond anything. I first got into theater way back. I remember my grandfather, whom I called Papa, was doing community theater. I wasn’t allowed to see it as I was barely 8 years old. Then I finally got to go. It was a play called Run for your Wife! It was a farce that I remember almost nothing about, but I do remember how it made me feel: I want to do this. From there, I just continued to seek it out at school or wherever I could. I trained at Cornish College of the Arts and have been a professional actor on stage and screen for almost 20 years now. I didn’t really start producing until I came to LA from Seattle. I had a short lived theater company in Seattle, but now being in LA LA Land – I feel the drive to make the theater I want to see.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
I moved to Los Angeles after having a decade of success on the stages in the Pacific Northwest. When I came here, I thought I would be making the transition into on-screen. While I found limited success, ultimately the rigmarole
of the audition game in LA left me feeling very hollow inside. Ultimately, it’s not what I want. Though I made a choice. I came to somewhere that has a huge industry without much community and the market to perform ANYWHERE is so competitive. This would have been a perfect moment for me to quit or move on from this silly dream of mine. Instead I said, “Well, maybe instead of trying to fit myself into LA, I’ll force LA to fit with me.” So that’s when I started producing more and creating opportunities to build a theater community. There is no reason to feel like we are in competition. That’s the capitalist way of thinking. This is art and a rising tide lifts all boats.
What’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative in your experience?
I truly think that the most rewarding aspect of being artist is never letting go of your inner child. The world is constantly forcing us to grow up, get a job, pay our bills. While that’s all important to stay alive, it doesn’t keep me thriving. I love feeling the drive, the need, the pull to keep creating. It just fills me with this giant sense of pride to see a creative project to the end. It’s a challenging thing to do, especially when you’re losing money more than anything else. But in the end, it’s not about that. It’s about getting a chance to tell stories, entertain and fill my soul.
Contact Info:
- Website: 1448hollywood@gmail.com
- Instagram: @RunBeeMc @1448hollywood @TheTimeMachine_2025
Image Credits
First photo of me: Nik Toren
All other photos for The Time Machine cast: Harrison Bobbins