14 DAY TRIAL // Benedict Cumberbatch might be the hottest male star right now, with fans and critics alike showing deep appreciation of his work and elegant manner of approaching the celebrity game, but he didn’t just pop up on the scene overnight.
He’s been around for many years before BBC One’s “Sherlock” turned him into an international “hottie” and led to the formation of his massive online fanbase, also known collectively as the Cumberladies. This is why he can’t believe when people tell him he’s sexy.
His appeal is a projection of his work in front of the camera
Benedict Cumberbatch has a theory: the actor sat down for a very extensive interview with NPR (check out the audio below), which is part of his ongoing Oscar campaign: he’s been nominated for Best Actor for his role as Alan Turing in “The Imitation Game.”
In the past few years, Cumberbatch has become a huge thing online, and he is considered, despite his out of the ordinary looks (or his otter-face, as he once put it), one of the most handsome and desirable men in showbiz. He is hot, he is smart and he is funny, so in one word, he is sexy as hell.
Well, not so much, he tries to explain. Sherlock is all these things, but not him.
“Being really hyperobjective about it, I kind of… do understand it because he’s aloof, he’s pretty cold and mean; but he’s utterly brilliant, can be incredibly charming, incredibly capable and smart and funny but also flawed. I think he’s rather a thrilling person to spend time with,” the actor tells NPR.
So when people or fans comment on Benedict’s appeal, they are doing so out of a very common mistake of assuming that the actor who plays a certain character has a lot in common with it.
“I sure as hell ain’t [all these things],” he says. “And I’ve been around for 10 or 15 years before this happened and I wasn’t on any lists of the millionth most attractive… It’s just very flattering and it makes me giggle, as [fans] know, because it is — it’s sort of silly. I think it is a reflection of the work and hopefully how I come across when I’m talking about the work, rather than what I actually have got.”
Fame and the loss of privacy
This is a topic that Cumberbatch is very passionate about, because he gets to experience it first-hand: this kind of appeal with fans that he’s enjoying is a great thing to happen to him but it also means having to kiss goodbye to his privacy.
It’s not just the fans who take more interest in his life, it’s the media and the paparazzi too, and that usually means being hounded and photographed wherever he goes, and not being able to slip through a crowd unrecognized anymore.
He clearly doesn’t love it, but he’s smart enough to know that talking as if it really bothered him would make him feel ungrateful, so he says that the loss of privacy is a price he’s paying gladly because it means he gets to do what he loves – and do it right, because so many people are enjoying his work.
Check out the interview: Benedict Cumberbatch isn’t just a pleasure to look at when in character, he’s also a pleasure to listen to, because of his posh British accent and velvety voice.