Benedict Cumberbatch Interview： Doctor Strange, The Thing With Feathers & Guy Ritchie's Wife & Dog

First off, I saw the movie yesterday and I absolutely loved it. I think it's an amazing, incredible movie and one thing that stands out about it is that this is your second film by my count that sees you playing a struggling father who is tormented by a nine-foot-tall supernatural creature who may or may not be inside his head. The first of course being Eric, which I also loved. Still, the movie does feel like a great departure from some of your previous roles, especially with its shades of psychological horror. So I'd love to hear more about what drew you to the project and how it's similar or different to some of your previous work. I mean, I think I'm a dad, so that's going to happen. I've been working a lot, so some themes might cross over. What did strike me is like, oh, hang on a minute, this is the second time that something is manifested as a kind of puppet. I mean, and out of the character's work as well, both artists. But the difference I guess with Eric is it's a sort of split personality disorder, whereas in this, it is extraordinary. It is syncratic imagining of what grief could be from his obsession with trying to bury himself in his work to shut grief down, and then it erupts from that page. But it's real to him and to his boys. That's the difference in experience they have as a family. And it's extraordinary work, extraordinary book of about 10 and a half years ago. I remember reading Max Porter's novella and just it's small but containing profound multitudes and being pinned to the wall, breathless. And like I often do when I read a book, it's very vivid and real in a cinematic sense. But I didn't think, oh, that's filmable because it's nonlinear. There's unreliable narration. Suddenly you're with the boys as older men looking back, you think, has this all been from their perspective all along, you know? And then there's the crow of it, this kind of incredible thing which is manifested in language, which is half bird, half onomatopoeic mangling of English. And a kind of crow himself kind of struggles as a voice between being Mary Poppins and Tyler Durden, as he does in the polarities of the movie as well. But it's all on the page. And it just drew me in. It just drew me in. The adaptation that Dylan then, somebody said there's a screen version of this in the mix, which we think is rather beautiful. Do you want to read the script? I said, sure. How did they do it? Who is the person that adapted this? Who was the director? And we met, and, you know, I knew a bit about Dylan. I'd seen Meet Me in the Bathroom, a big fan of his work. But I didn't know if he could hold a narrative form together or what he would be like for an actor going through a process, and especially one as sort of challenging as this. And we had a very fun, fast friendship from the first meeting. And it's been like that ever since. So the trust built very quickly. And it's been a wonderful collaboration. So, yeah, a lot of factors, but chiefly and first and foremost, the book. And as an actor, you know, these are dark, difficult, complex things to inhabit, but that's kind of me. Tyler Durden meets Mary Poppins is maybe the best description. Tyler Durden and Mary Poppins, right? I mean, it is. It's like he's a comfort blanket at one moment, and then he's a pain in the ass and throwing him around, punching him up and causing mayhem, which is what grief is. It is all of those things. It is those polarities. It's bizarrely something that people, we grow used to. You learn to live with it, which I guess is the great kind of arc of the story of the film. But before you do, you wrestle with it. You push it away and it smacks you back. It comes at you unexpectedly in all sorts of ways. So it's bizarre. It's bizarre. I'm one of the most satisfying feedbacks I've had from people who've experienced grief. And I say to them, I test it, I go, I've been the crow, it works for me. And they're like, yes, yes, because it is that bizarre. It's that unexpected, unruly, unwanted, and unwelcome. It's just all over the place. Thank you. Absolutely. And David's wonderful in the movie as well as the voice of the crow. I wish that was him in the costume. It's an amazing Eric Lampere, a physical comedy actor, clown actor, who's framed at Le Coq in Paris. We didn't know that David was cast, but we wanted him from Mike Lee's name. That was the voice always in Dylan and my imagination. And then he saw the film and voiced it afterwards. But Eric was doing an impersonation of him on set in this crazy, stilted, eight foot tall, animatronic headed costume, which was both helpful and unhelpful at other times, because it was so much, it was like a theatre performance. And it was whether or not Crow was going to be more up front and centre or more suggestive in different moments, whether he was going to be a heartbeat or a voice or a breath or a movement or a shadow or a full on confrontational physical animal being. So, yeah, we played with those elements on the day. I'm no stranger to working with stuff that's both in the space and not. So it was another weird day at the office for a Marvel actor. But yeah, kind of challenging as well. Another element that works so well about the movie is the two boys who play your sons in the movie, Henry and Richard, are both wonderful in the film. And in addition to being actual brothers, this is also their first IMDb credited roles ever. What's that experience like working so prominently with two first time actors? And what advice might you have for anyone who's on a big feature film set for the first time? It's extraordinary. Well, there's seven, so I don't know a good seven year old's advice. It's just you have to kind of get through it and see how it works. You have to be responsive to the children and not necessarily safeguarding the natural parental and producorial responsibility you have for being adults. Looking after children on the set, you as an actor opposite them, I felt obviously paternal as the character. I felt paternal as a dad myself and as a producer caring for them. And I also felt they were friends. You know, I felt like we were forming an amazing kind of weird story out of compromise and coercion and play and that's what it should be. And I don't think I've got any advice for them. You know, they taught me. They taught me how to just exist in front of the camera and not try or think too hard about it. Not overly worry. And also tell people when they've had enough. I stick around for too long and try too hard. They were wonderful. And there were days when, you know, seven year old kids, they just didn't want to play. And there was one scene in particular where they had to dress up in their mum's clothes and put lipstick and makeup on, put earrings on, put some jewelry on. I told them to go to bed and I'm absorbing myself from my work. I go next door and they haven't done anything and I see them and I lose my temper with them. It's a very powerful scene in the end, but they wouldn't do it. They weren't into it. No, not doing that. So Dylan had to get them, you know, to compromise. He said, all right, well, okay, you don't want to do that. Well, why don't you get me to do something I don't want to do? You can do something to me if you agree to do that in return. Okay. They got the lipstick and they wrote poo on his forehead, put it all over his mouth and called him weak man for the rest. They were they were live wires. And but, you know, they were great. I'm terribly fond of them. We all were speaking first when it comes to filmmaking, looking to the future a little bit. You're working with a filmmaker who's one of my personal favorites, Guy Ritchie on Life and Dog with an incredible cast of Rosamond Pike and Anthony Hopkins. From what we've heard so far, it sounds like a bit of a return to form for Ritchie. But I'd love to hear more if you can tease anything. I don't know. I think it's I mean, you know, there are definitely elements to his genre, but I it's I don't know. I think he's kind of augmented it with a with a really new flavor and I don't really want to give much away, but it's. It's it's it's yeah, it's quite a unique very soulful piece. And, yeah, an extraordinary cast that I got to work with and a very different ask for me to be the kind of geezer Tom, Jason Straton type role. And yeah, it was. It was a blast. I mean, I love him. He's he's he's very uncompromising. He's very who he is. And it's just very straightforward working with him. You know where you are. And yeah, one final question for you. Unfortunately for both of us, I suffer from a condition called chronical nerditis. So I got to ask. It's been you know, it's only been three years. It feels like it's been eons since we last saw Stephen Strange. I know. Multiverse of Madness ended on such a cliffhanger. Yeah, I'm sure you're limited in what you can and can't say, given the marvel of it all. But do you have at least the slightest sense of what might be next for Dr. Strange or are you still waiting for that call? Oh, I have more than a sense, but I can't share it. That's the usual. Honestly, that's the usual Stonewall. Sorry. But yeah, that is perfectly fine. That's honestly all I wanted to hear. He's coming. We will see you again. Hopefully at some point. At some point. Yeah, you definitely will. Wonderful. Well, Benedict, this has been one to cross off the interview bucket list. Oh, thank you. And an absolute treat and a pleasure. I get it. Congrats on the movie. Thanks so much. I can't wait for what you next. Thank you. Thank you. Appreciate that. Look forward to speaking again soon.