Benedict Cumberbatch
Benedict Cumberbatch
Benedict Timothy Carlton Cumberbatch CBE is an English actor and film producer who has performed in film, television, theatre and radio. The son of actors Timothy Carlton and Wanda Ventham, he graduated from the University of Manchester and continued his training at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, obtaining a Master of Arts in Classical Acting. He first performed at the Open Air Theatre, Regent's Park in Shakespearean productions and has portrayed George Tesman in Richard Eyre's revival...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionMovie Actor
Date of Birth19 July 1976
CityLondon, England
I can feel infinitely alive curled up on the sofa reading a book.
You come into this world as you leave it, on your own. It's made me want to live a life slightly less ordinary.
Mum did a lot of commercial theatre and farces in the 1980s and '90s to make sure the school bills were paid.
[Season 4 of Sherlock Holmes will be] myopically dark. You're talking about the end of the universe darkness. You can't see in front of you and would walk into everything dark.
Sherlock [Holmes] is on the side of the angels, but don't think he's one of them. He uses similar means, but it seems to be for a better purpose, one would hope.
Mystique is rare now, isn't it? There aren't that many enigmas in this modern world.
I think it's fair to say that, yeah, I'm playing Doctor Strange, I get there.
I suppose my bodily proportions are quite flattering. I'm ripped, doing something I wouldn't normally do with my body, or having done to it, involving Watson,
I always seem to be cast as slightly wan, ethereal, troubled intellectuals or physically ambivalent bad lovers. But I'm here to tell you I'm quite the opposite in real life. In fact I'm a f**king fantastic lover.
I like to think that we’re revolving on this planet and revolving through the galaxy. I love having context that’s so much bigger than I can fathom. It’s fantastic to realise how insignificant you are.
I'm aware of [Doctor Strange] place within the comic pantheon of it all, the Marvelverse, but I don't email saying, "When are we doing next film?" I'm excited to see.
I try to work hard. I'm really proud of what I get to do as a living. I still pinch myself. But I also know it's a craft, and I can get better at it and learn every time I do it. So I try to work hard no matter what the task is.
Cumberbatch - it sounds like a fart in a bath, doesn't it? What a fluffy old name. I can never say it on a Monday morning. When I became an actor, Mum wasn't keen on me keeping it.
I've been very lucky at what's happened in my career to date, but playing something as far from me as possible is an ambition of mine - anything from a mutated baddy in a comic book action thriller, to a detective. If anything, I'd like Gary Oldman's career: he's the perfect example of it. I've love to have a really broad sweep of characters - to be able to do something edgy, surprising and unfashionable.