I really didn’t expect yesterday’s “secret girlfriend” post to blow up the way it did, but that’s what I get for underestimating the interest in Bendy Cumber. Benny Batch? Benedict Cumberbatch. Anyway, Bendy is starting to do print interview in support of The Imitation Game and his first big magazine cover this time around is… Time Out London? Don’t get me wrong, I like when a guy goes for more “local” press rather than industry press. And granted, this cover is strangely enchanting (the otter’s eyes are hypnotizing me). But I hope Bendy also gets, like, a cover of GQ or Details or some major magazine too.
In the Time Out interview, Bendy blamed Ellen DeGeneres for his now infamous photobombing of U2 at the Oscars. He said:
“Yes, I photobombed U2! But that was all Ellen DeGeneres’s fault because she plied everyone with vodka on the red carpet,” he alleged. “Her team was handing out these miniatures. A friend really wanted me to get a photo with U2. So I just saw the opportunity and I’ve never felt an impulse like it. I spotted them all standing around and I thought, ‘Perfect!’ It wasn’t preordained or anything. I just did it.”
And he admitted having a marvellous time at the awards.
“Oh god, I had a ridiculously good time. I was a little nervous, but then I got there and, like everything on screen, it was smaller than you expect it to be. I felt like I crashed the party a bit.”
Bendy also gave a recent interview to Hello where he discussed his upcoming Oscar campaign. Only he’s very careful to not count his Cumbers before they’ve Batched. That’s how I’m taking this:
Benedict Cumberbatch has brushed off speculation that he is on track for his first Academy Award, insisting it is too early to start discussing winners. The Sherlock star, 38, has been tipped for the big prize after earning rave reviews for his new film The Imitation Game.
The modest actor told Hello! Magazine that although winning an Oscar would be “amazing,” it is “so premature that it would almost be futile to talk about it”.
“I understand why it always happens at festivals but I just got my suit back from the dry cleaners from this year’s Oscars,” he said. “There are lots of films to see before we start going, ‘Ooh, blah, blah’.”
For Cumberbatch, doing justice to a great story is his number one concern.
“The most important thing is that any kind of buzz creates an interest in the film, which means people will see it hopefully and that means the Alan Turing story will get to a broader audience,” he said. “And that, as a storyteller, is all I am concerned about. And if I have done a good job as him as well, that’s great.”
I like him for attempting to keep it real and this attempt at humility and perspective. But I think we’re past the point where Bendy can pretend that he’s not in The Weinstein Campaign Machine as we speak. Harvey Weinstein has already let it be known that he is really going to push TIG in general and Benedict in particular this season. Benedict is already on nearly all major critics’ “best of/Oscar prediction” lists. It’s also okay to come out and say, “Yeah, I’m going to campaign this year. I really believe in this film. I’m breaking out the velvet, darlings.”
Photos courtesy of WENN, Time Out London.
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