Sherlock is a bit of a superhero in a way...
He has the brains and British stiff upper lip down to a tee, but Benedict Cumberbatch is ready to tackle new territory as the latest Marvel superhero to grace the big screen. He tells GEMMA DUNN how he loved getting into character for Doctor Strange
HE has just announced that his wife Sophie Hunter is expecting their second child, but Benedict Cumberbatch is giving little else away when it comes to his private life – except to say fatherhood has changed it for the better.
“It adds – it never takes away,” says the 40-year-old actor, who became a parent for the first time last year, with the birth of his son, Christopher. “Lots of people, especially women, get told, ‘Oh you know, it’s going to really affect your career’, and it does, but for the better in most cases that I know.
“I am in a very privileged position in my career,” he recognises, “but I think everyone – even if they’re in a challenging time in their life – draws strength from their children. They’re inspirations rather than hindrances.”
Meeting early morning, Benedict – dressed in a simple navy jumper and jeans – flits between charming and impatient, starting the chat with an ice-breaking apology (“Sorry if I smell of breakfast”), before skimming over niceties (“We don’t have much time”). He’s a busy man, and don’t we know it.
The son of actors Timothy Carlton and Wanda Ventham, the London-born star trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, obtaining a Masters in classical acting before pursuing his career in theatre first, and later in TV and film, where he’s gained a legion of fans thanks to his Oscarnominated portrayal of code breaker Alan Turing in 2014’s acclaimed The Imitation Game, and as the titular Sherlock in the BBC’s much-loved contemporised series.
He recalls a time when he was held hostage by armed carjackers while filming 2005 mini-series To The Ends Of The Earth in South Africa, at which point he poignantly told the media: “It taught me that you come into this world as you leave it, on your own. It’s made me want to live a life slightly less ordinary.” He’s certainly kept to his word. “I started out in this profession with two parents to look up to, who’d had successful careers, who’d had the respect of their peers and who had a good time doing a job you know,
1DR STRANGELOVE (1964)
STANLEY KUBRICK’S satire of Cold War nuclear lunacy stars Peter Sellers as the USA’s (ex-Nazi) advisor, who suggests the top brass pass the apocalypse in a bunker, surrounded by ‘stimulating females’ to repopulate Earth.
2Dr
at times, can be tough on family, because of timing, being peripatetic and the odd hours we work, as well as all over the place,” he begins.
“I saw all of that and I thought, ‘If I do half as good a job as they’re doing, then I’m fine’. And things kind of snowballed.
“But their standards are the standards I wanted to meet when I started out,” he adds.
OMAR SHARIF became an international heartthrob after playing the titular medic. The epic romance plays out between Sharif and Julie Christie’s Lara, against the backdrop of Russia’s march to revolution
3BACK TO THE FUTURE (1985)
CHRISTOPHER LLOYD is Doc Brown, a mad scientist who invents a time machine that takes Marty McFly (Michael J Fox) back to 1955, where he must fend off the amorous intentions of his (then teenaged) mum to fix history.