If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve seen a lot of Dove Cameron lately. For 56 days or more (which, as it happens, is the title of her new thriller series) the star has powered through the kind of promotional tour that would have any publicity team popping bottles. We’ve seen her be vulnerable on Call Her Daddy, pore over intimate wedding details for Vogue, tackling each press commitment with unflinching candor—every reveal spawning a fresh wave of news aggregation. Everyone, it seems, loves Dove.

None of this is foreign territory for Dove Cameron, a graduate of the Disney school of get-it-done—one of Hollywood’s most demanding training grounds. 56 Days marks a return to the small screen, after appearing in Paramount’s Big Nate and Apple TV+’s  Schmigadoon!. The moment feels especially full circle: the show shares a showrunner with a gritty series about a kidnapped spy that Cameron auditioned for—and narrowly missed—when she first arrived in Los Angeles. That was the kind of introduction she once imagined for herself, the scrappy kid holding her own in an all-adult world, before Disney Channel came knocking with an offer she couldn’t refuse: leading her own series as the titular twins on Liv and Maddie. Although, naturally, double the roles meant double the work.

“I do think that it’s a wonder that I haven’t burnt out yet because of the way that I’ve always been working,” she says. “[Disney] was extremely exhausting. You’re just filming so much, you’re promoting so much, you’re traveling, you’re always in promo mode. It really is a full-time gig. It’s not like working as an adult, you go and do the project for two months and then you have time off. With Disney, it just never stops. It’s your whole world.”

With the end of her latest promotional cycle in sight, I find Dove Cameron on her bathroom floor, an apt reflection of how she characterizes her position in Hollywood: “One foot in, one foot out.” On our Zoom call, the star’s rectangle is marked by her birth name—Chloe Hosterman—by which she is still known to those closest to her. “Dove” was a childhood nickname bequeathed by her father, and adopted as a moniker when the actress first arrived to Hollywood. Chloe vs. Dove still contributes to confusion on set, as well as, perhaps, to the perception of Cameron’s somewhat fissured identity. For as long as she’s been in the spotlight, Dove Cameron has lived in the in-between—first juggling the dual roles of Liv and Maddie, then balancing two careers: acting and music.

“I think that it used to feel like my public identity was divorced from my identity when I’m in my house, in my kitchen, my socks and whatever,” she explains. “I did think I used to think of when I’m ‘on,’ and now I just sort of feel like it’s all the same. I haven’t felt that I needed to be anything else in the spotlight for a number of years now. So whether I’m in my house or backstage or I just did a panel it really is the same conversations and answers I would be giving if I were in my living room. I don’t feel the need to perform a personality like I did when I was a teenager or in my 20s.”

Newly 30, Cameron is confronting past traumas head on. While some are touched by tragedy young, she was pummeled—losing both her father and childhood best friend abruptly at formative ages. The experiences were in direct conflict with her presentation: “People-pleasing, perpetually happy and bubbly.”

“A lot of my stuff that I talk about really openly now just wasn’t ‘child’ subject matter [when I started out]. It just was the wrong audience…I just feel comfortable integrating all of the other sides of myself in public now. I was just like, this sort of pretending to always be okay isn’t really serving anyone—especially not me. I was fucking sad. I was so sad. It wasn’t that I wasn’t going to talk about my trauma, it’s just that those questions weren’t being asked. And if I ever mentioned them, it would be like, ‘Whoa, that’s really dark. So, what’s your favorite ice cream flavor?’”

The relentless visibility produced by work, work, and more work gave Disney alumni a rare pass to roam across entertainment. Whereas other actors testing new waters were met with stay-in-your-lane resistance, Disney stars were relatively exempt. For a musical theater-obsessive like Cameron, that license was everything.

“I feel lucky because Disney kind of helped me launch my music career, which I don’t really think would’ve happened if I had started doing dramatic adult work when I was that age,” Cameron says.

Cameron clarifies that she doesn’t have an abundance of industry relationships—despite the perception of the public that Disney alumni run in packs. She met Miley Cyrus once, though their alma mater went undiscussed, and while she still feels a kinship with Ariana Greenblatt, former Liv and Maddie guest star, she doesn’t have her number. Still, Cameron remembers distinctly when Gary Marsh, the Disney Channel executive credited with discovering Selena Gomez and championing Liv and Maddie, thought the pair shared enough in common to warrant an introduction.

“He said, ‘I’d really like it if you spoke with her, because I see a similar path for you.’ I went to her house, we ate toast on the floor, and she was really, really nice. It’s funny—I’ve never seen her since.”

Unlike so many former child stars who announce adulthood through shock-value wardrobes and overtly grown themes, Dove Cameron didn’t arrive via a hard pivot. Her transition, instead, seemed mostly guided by aesthetics; darkened hair, jet-black liner, tattoos creeping over her fingertips. Bubbly, blonde Cameron was in metamorphosis.

“[For years] I would try to express who I actually was, how I was actually feeling, and people would not understand or see it,” she says. “They’d be like, ‘No, you’re this.’ I think I realized that I was doing a disservice to not only myself, but also the audience. No one really knew me. I still see the fallout of people thinking something has changed when in reality I’ve just deepened.”

Creatively, Cameron emerged from her post-Disney chrysalis with “Boyfriend,” which earned the singer New Artist of the Year at the American Music Awards and a coveted opening slot on Dua Lipa’s Radical Optimism tour, ultimately going double-platinum. Though Cameron had come out publicly via Instagram Live in  2020, the track marked her first sonic exploration of her bisexuality—something she had previously avoided addressing, wary of accusations that she might be leveraging queerness for clout.

“I came out of the closet, but I didn’t ever once make any decisions because I wanted to change people’s perception. I was simply growing,” she explains, continuing, “As a culture, we uphold this idea of the young girl being almost worthy of worship and then worthy of hatred in this very patriarchal, strange examination lens…I don’t subscribe to any of that narrative or fascination.”

‍56 Days marks another maturation milestone for Cameron. The thriller series, based on Catherine Ryan Howard’s 2021 novel, follows a short-lived, ill-fated relationship, between Ciara (Cameron) and Oliver, played by Avan Jogia. It was serendipity that she counted Killing Eve and You among her favorite series when Karyn Usher, the 56 Days creator who kept tabs on Cameron for almost two decades, came calling.

“She was like, ‘Hey, I always wanted to work with you, I think this part is perfect for you, please tell me if you’re interested.’ I fell in love with the character and the opportunity for so much self-expression and intensity. I had one meeting with them on Zoom while I was doing my Cosmo cover shoot, and I stepped into another room in a wig and they were like, “How do you see this character?” And we were just aligned.”

After years of making music on instinct, returning to the regimented routine of a film set required an adjustment—and not just for Cameron. Damiano David, the frontman of Italian band Måneskin and Cameron’s now-fiancé, got a firsthand glimpse of her former life while she was shooting 56 Days.

“There was a lot of learning with that, what long, long set days look like and the fact that I’m not on my phone. And as a [music] artist, you’re able to be like, ‘Hey, I’m really tired. I’m going to come back to the studio tomorrow.’ I’m in control. On set, I’m a part of a big machine and our lives were really dictated by this show, and that was something that we learned how to do together.”

Dove Cameron and Damiano David’s meet-cute feels lifted from modern romantic lore: Cameron shared a clip of Måneskin to her Instagram story long before the two ever got to know one another. Now, David is the first person she turns to when creative inspiration hits. With David recently in Rome, the couple found themselves back to communicating virtually. When Cameron sent him a new song she’d written, he called her immediately.

“‘This is the best thing you’ve ever written,’” she remembers him responding. “It’s so profound in this way—these harmonies, that bridge. There’s this appreciation that someone who isn’t a musician might not hear. We can geek out together in that way.”

The two have no plans to collaborate, keeping their relationship firmly off-screen, even as Cameron quietly readies another undisclosed project. If it feels like she’s on the brink of ubiquity—more so than ever—that’s because it’s inevitable. Dove Cameron, née Chloe Hosterman, is finally doing what she came here to do: create what she wants, say what she wants, and be who she wants—without compromise, whatever it takes.

“Now I’m 30, [nothing I decide to do] is about how the public views me…I am all about people becoming who they feel they should be. True role models are those trying to authentically become themselves every day.”

Photographed by Petros Kouiouris

Styled by Marc Eram

Written by Batrice Hazlehurst

Hair: Clayton Hawkins

Makeup: Ernesto Casillas

Flaunt Film: Meech

Production Assistant: Abby Shewmaker

Location: Vision Studios