Benedict Cumberbatch, whose full name is Benedict Timothy Carlton Cumberbatch. He came into this world on July 19, 1976, in London, England. He became an acclaimed British motion picture, theatre, and television actor. In particular, he is known for his portrayals of intelligent, often upper-crust characters. Moreover, for his deep resonant voice, and his distinctively unique name.
He gained widespread popularity playing a modern Sherlock Holmes in the television series Sherlock (2010– 2017). Specifically, this is where I became a Cumberbitch ( a self-coined term used to refer to avid fans of Benedict Cumberbatch)instantly. While subsequently, he garnered a succession of substantial roles in mainstream feature films that propelled him into international stardom.
Benedict began his acting career in the theatre in the early 2000s by acting in a handful of roles on TV. He made his film debut in 2006. It was the BBC show Sherlock that gave him global stardom. A favorite of mine as a fan of the Sherlock Holmes franchise. He played the titular role in the modern-day adaptation of Arthur Conan Doyle’s popular detective stories. He found further fame Doctor Strange in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Whereas this is a role he is reprising in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Need I say anymore! Keep on reading for interesting facts about his life and career that you may not be aware of.
His Education
Benedict Cumberbatch was born on 19 July 1976, in London, England, to Timothy Carlton and Wanda Ventham. Cumberbatch started acting at a young age while attending London’s Harrow School. He was a member of The Rattigan Society, a club for the dramatic arts.
At the start of his career, he used his father’s stage name, Carlton, but, encouraged by a colleague, he began to appear under the family’s original name, unusual surname to attract greater professional attention.
He made his acting debut as Titania, Queen of the Fairies, in a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream when he was 12 years old. After he graduated from Harrow, Cumberbatch took a gap year to volunteer as an English teacher in Darjeeling, India, before he attended the Victoria University of Manchester, where he studied drama.
He continued acting at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art, where he graduated with a master’s of arts in classical acting.
His Start in Films
Cumberbatch starred in the 2011 Royal National Theatre adaptation of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, in which he alternated Jonny Lee Miller in the roles of Victor Frankenstein and his creature. He earned rave reviews for his work and won several major theatrical awards, including the 2012 Olivier Award in Britain. He rounded out 2011 with roles in two high-profile films, Steven Spielberg’s War Horse and a big-screen adaptation of author John le Carré’s Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy.
Personal Life
After rising to fame as yet another modern-day incarnation of Sherlock Holmes, the effervescent Benedict Cumberbatch inevitably became a regular fixture of those lists that attempt to find the world’s most eligible bachelors. Anyone hoping to ensnare the classically-trained actor was, therefore, left broken-hearted when he revealed that he’d been taken off the shelf for good.
Benedict Cumberbatch is married to the British Theatre and Opera director Sophie Hunter.
Sophie Hunter, an actor-turned-opera director, is the lucky lady who has captured the heart of the thinking woman’s crumpet. And within a year pf dating, the loved-up pair became husband and wife. Unsurprisingly for a man who’s always been fairly dismissive of the press, Cumberbatch hasn’t exactly been too forthcoming about what makes him and his partner tick. Understandably, Benedict has remained private about his personal life. You could say that he is a hopeless romantic. In a recent Mother’s Day, 2022 SNL show, monologue he paid tribute to his beautiful wife. I sure did melt into a puddle at the sweet gesture.
The loving couple had three sons, namely Christopher Carlton Cumberbatch, Finn Cumberbatch, and Hal Auden Cumberbatch.
Notable Films
Cumberbatch achieved a new level of fame as the villain Khan in the Hollywood blockbuster Star Trek into Darkness (2013). That same year he played WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange The Fifth Estate; a well-intentioned slave owner in 12 Years a Slave, an adaptation of Solomon Northup’s narrative (1853) of his life in captivity; and a hapless young man in August: Osage County, based on the play by Tracy Letts. He also lent his posh growl to the computer-animated dragon Smaug in The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013), the second installment in director Peter Jackson’s film trilogy of J.R.R. Tolkien’s novels.
Other Prominent Roles
In 2014, Cumberbatch starred as mathematician and logician Alan Turing in The Imitation Game, voiced an animated wolf in the comedy Penguins of Madagascar, and reprised his role as Smaug in The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. Cumberbatch returned to the stage as the titular Danish prince in a 2015 production of Hamlet. The entire run of the show, produced at the Barbican Centre, sold out a year in advance of the play’s opening. Also in 2015, he appeared in the film Black Mass as a state senator (and brother of gangster Whitey Bulger).
His Early Contributions to Films and Television
Cumberbatch went on to star in films like Atonement and The Other Boleyn Girl before his big break, as Sherlock Holmes in BBC’s Sherlock, which ran for four seasons from 2010 to 2017.
Cumberbatch returned to television in A Child in Time (2017), a movie adapted from Ian McEwan’s novel of the same name about a father whose child goes missing, and Patrick Melrose (2018), a miniseries based on five novels by Edward St. Aubyn focuses on a self-destructive English gentleman as he reckons about his past. Cumberbatch supplied his distinctive voice for the animated features The Grinch and Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle (both 2018), playing the eponymous curmudgeon and the villainous tiger Shere Khan, respectively.
Benedict’s Connection to India
Benedict Cumberbatch, Marvel’s infamous Doctor Strange, talks about his love for lassi. He conveys how the lassi ‘Love how it cools the palate’ in a recent interview with Hindustan Times. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness star Benedict Cumberbatch opened up about his love for India and Indian food in a recent interview, revealing his favorite dishes from the multi-cultural country.
Benedict Cumberbatch, the star of Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, is no stranger to India. The actor has made multiple visits to the country. Before he found international fame through his roles as Sherlock and Doctor Strange. In a recent interview promoting his latest release, the actor spoke about his time in India and about the food he loved during his stay there.
Previously, Benedict had spoken about how he stayed in a Tibetan monastery in West Bengal once for several months as a teenager. He touched upon it once again in an interaction with Brut. On being asked if he had ever visited India, he said,
“Yes! Once, for about six months, when I was 19. I taught in a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in West Bengal, near Darjeeling, Sonada. And then I traveled a little bit around the north of India. Never really made it to the south but spent a wonderful month in Rajasthan. Very, very fond of my time there!”
Benedict then spoke about the kind of food that he loved the most during his stay in India.
“Tibetan tea I got an odd kind of taste for, which is saying something. It’s kind of milky and buttery and salty. And I love their dumplings as well, so I ate a lot of Tibetan food. Raita, I love, lassi, I love. I love how it cools the palate, especially if you’re a hot-hit with the curry, ” he added.
Films and TV Starring Benedict Cumberbatch
Credits from 2019 included Brexit, a TV movie following the 2016 campaign to withdraw Britain from the European Union; The Current War (completed in 2017 and released two years later), about the contest between Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse to determine which electrical system would power the United States. And the World War I drama 1917, which was directed by Sam Mendes.
Cumberbatch later portrayed a Cold War spy in The Courier (2020). In 2021 he appeared in several films, including The Mauritanian, which was based on the memoir of a man held at the Guantánamo Bay detention camp for 14 years, and The Electrical Life of Louis Wain, a biopic about a British artist who was known for his anthropomorphic drawings of cats. However, his most notable performance that year was in Jane Campion’s The Power of the Dog, a western about a rancher whose cruelty—especially towards his brother and the latter’s wife—hides inner turmoil. For his work in the film, Cumberbatch received an Oscar nomination.
Breakthrough as Sherlock
To understand just what kind of pop culture phenomenon the BBC’s Sherlock was (and, arguably, still is), one only needs to look at the career trajectory of its stars. Before the acclaimed modern-day reimagining of the classic detective tales started in 2010. Benedict Cumberbatch (who, of course, plays Sherlock Holmes) was a BBC regular with a strong theater background. And a propensity for portraying real-life figures like Stephen Hawking and Vincent Van Gogh.
The first series dropped in 2010, and the next two followed at two-year intervals. Mainly giving you a fairly good idea of the show’s production schedule in an optimal situation. However, 2016 only brought a single special episode, and season 4 didn’t arrive until 2017, throwing off the whole “a season every other year” schedule. What’s more, co-creator Stephen Moffat told Radio Times in 2018 that the release date of the eventual season 5 is very much up in the air.
Cumberbatch has recently stated that he’d be fully on board for a Sherlock return in an ideal situation. “Maybe one day, if the script’s right. And I say ‘the script,’ maybe it could be a film rather than a series. Who knows? But anyway, not for now.”
The MCU
The handsome Benedict Cumberbatch plays Doctor Strange in the Marvel films. While Benedict will soon be seen in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. Specifically, part two of Marvel Studios’ Doctor Strange (2016). While this film will mark his fifth appearance as Dr. Stephen Strange aka Sorcerer Supreme in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Benedict’s Future in the MCU
Benedict Cumberbatch says he would be keen to keep playing Doctor Strange for at least another ten years – but only if the studio continues to “exercise his full potential as a character”.
In a new interview with the National Post, the Marvel actor was asked about the superhero’s future within the MCU, and whether or not he could see himself donning the (sentient) cloak throughout the next decade.
Dr.Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Marvel Studios’ Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness is officially out in the world.
With that, titular star Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays Dr. Stephen Strange / Doctor Strange. Stephen Strange / Doctor Strange has been reflecting on Strange’s journey through the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Whereas starting with Marvel Studios’ Doctor Strange (2006), to Avengers: Infinity War (2018) and Avengers: Endgame (2019), and most recently in Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), and what it means to play the “elder statesman.”
In Spider-Man: No Way Home, Doctor Strange cast a spell that ended up leaking into the multiverse. Mainly bringing in villains and heroes from Spider-Man movies from the past.
In Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Stephen will still be dealing with the effects of this spell, leading him to bring in the skills of Elizabeth Olsen’s Scarlet Witch.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness has been labeled as a horror movie. And it certainly seems to have a darker tone when compared to Spider-Man: No Way Home.
Awards
He won the British Academy Television Award for Best Actor for his performance as the title character in Patrick Melrose. Additionally, he earned six Primetime Emmy Award nominations, winning the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie for playing the role of Sherlock Holmes in Sherlock.
He also received three Laurence Olivier Award nominations, winning the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor for Frankenstein. His portrayal of Alan Turing in The Imitation Game earned him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.
In addition, he has received seven British Academy of Film and Television Arts nominations, five Screen Actors Guild Award nominations, and three Golden Globe Award nominations, among others.
In 2014, Time magazine included him in its annual Time 100 as one of the “Most Influential People in the World“. He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in June 2015, for his services to the performing arts and charity. On 1 July 2018, Cumberbatch was awarded the Outstanding Achievement Award at The South Bank Sky Arts Awards.
Benedict Cumberbatch’s Doubtful Habits
It’s official—mega-talented British actor Benedict Cumberbatch is vegan. While promoting the highly anticipated Avengers: Infinity War, the Doctor Strange actor mentioned—during three separate interviews—his vegan diet.
While Benedict Cumberbatch may claim that he is a vegan, it couldn’t be anything farther from the truth. During the press tour for Dr.Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, he eats fish balls with his fellow co-star Elizabeth Olsen, who plays the Scarlet Witch on the Kelly Clarkson Show. That is not all. To the Indian news outlets as mentioned before, he said that he is fond of lassi ( a yogurt-based drink). Being a Cumberbitch, I bear witness to a highly influential person who lies about his diet to please PETA. Nothing is true anymore when it comes to celebrities, especially their obnoxious diet advice. It is very damaging, especially to young fans who idealize him.
Conclusion
Benedict Cumberbatch is a force of nature when it comes to acting, but he should refrain from answering questions about his diet in the future.
I am patiently waiting to watch Dr. Strange in the Multiverse of Madness in IMAX, 2D, or HD on any streaming platform. The die-hard MCU fan in me is always eager to know what is happening next in the MCU and Dr. Strange is an integral part of that universe.
