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'm really not Sherlock Holmes. I look a little bit like him and sound like him.
People always want to knock you when you're up.
Animations are really powerful - it's not just entertainment, it's a very cunning way to get good ideas across.
I always get self-conscious about what I look like in a film, but less so if I'm a character very far removed from who I am. Then I just worry about the performance, and that's equally an odd experience.
I thought, well, why am I giving up on my primary dream to work doubly hard, to do something as an alternative to what it really still want to?
There was a moment of extraordinary humbleness and humility and pride, as well, with my father when he turned to me - and I think it was after I played Salieri in "Amadeus" at university. And he said, You're better than I ever was or ever could be, you should do this for profession. You'd have a good time.
I had to imagine myself into certain aspects of [Julian Assange] character for our version of events. That involved extrapolating based on clues in his biography, his public persona, photographs, and other accounts of him by people who encountered him during that extraordinary period from 2007 to 2010 that we charted in the film [The Fifth Estate ]. So, it involved a lot of research but, sadly, no contact with the man himself.
I have memories of clouds whisking by while sitting in the pushchair on the roof of my parents' flat. I loved it! I just loved staring at the clouds and dreaming away.
If I'd had fame early on, I'd have been able to abuse it in the way that a young man should.
I had the privilege of being able to choose, or at least have the opportunity to work at, being anything but an actor.
My first, big, silly role at school was as Arthur Crocker-Harris in Rattigan's 'The Browning Version,' where my job was to make school-masters' wives weep with recognition.
There's a huge amount of footage of Julian [ Assange] online, but he's usually in presentation or defending mode, talking about his cause, or the revelations which Wikileaks have brought about. There's none of Assange relaxing or in private mode. There's none of the personality I tried to give him behind closed doors [in The Fifth Estate ].
It'd be really nice to wake up looking like, I don't know, Jake Gyllenhaal and think, 'Let's try this on for a day and see how it feels.'
I did a lot of acting at school and university, then I went to drama school. It was quite a normal route.