Everyone is talking about the trippiest film of the year, Doctor Strange which hits theaters on November 4th. Lead by Benedict Cumberbatch as Doctor Stephen Strange, the film takes everything you thought you knew about film technology and trumps it.
Personally, I’ve been stupid excited to see this film since it was announced in 2014, and when we were given a taste of it at D23 EXPO 2015. I’ve always loved the spell-casting powers of the Doctor Strange Marvel Hero, and seeing his powers transcend the page to the big screen is super exciting. As a huge Marvel fan, you can imagine my excitement when I found out I would be heading to Los Angeles with the Disney / Marvel blogger team to interview the cast and director of Doctor Strange including the Doctor himself.
It’s about cultism and east meets west mysticism, you know, in the ‘60s. -Benedict Cumberbatch
My Interview with Benedict Cumberbatch – Doctor Stephen Strange
In usual Hollywood fashion, my interview with Benedict Cumberbatch took place at the stunning Montage Beverly Hills Hotel. It’s nice seeing the reaction of talent as they walk in the door to twenty-five mom bloggers. They are always super happy to see us and it makes for a very easy and fun interview.
Benedict on the Film
Benedict told us about his talks with Director Scott Derrickson regarding his civilian character and describes the film before seeing it in full.
In the 21st-Century you can make magic look pretty cool on the big screen. It’s got all those sort of psychedelic elements, like real big left turn that Ditko did with his drawings which was just mind blowing still.
Scott pitched the story that humor was gonna be really important to him, and Benedict was excited to be a part of it, but at first had so much on his plate he didn’t think he could do it.
I couldn’t. And it went away for a bit and I was heartbroken. And then they came out and said we can’t not make this film with you. We really need it to be you. For the first time ever in Marvel’s history, they postponed the schedule of the making and the release of the film. Which was amazing. And that, from the ultimate fan boy in Kevin was a particularly amazing thing. And it meant I had a huge amount of responsibility to live up to their faith in me, but that was a great motivation.
When I sat down with Scott and I gave him a few of my concerns about the onuses of the character, how sort of acerbically arrogant he was… I thought, I play other elements of that in other characters as you probably know, and I wanna just round the edges a little bit, make him more human. I wanted to understand what makes him who he becomes.
Benedict on Seeing the Film for the First Time
We had already screened the film the night before. Walking into the interview we did not realize Benedict had yet to see it. It was kind of exciting knowing that he was in for this huge, mind-blowing experience. He tells us about his thoughts on seeing the film for the first time:
It’s a very heightened environment to see a film for the first time. I think I might be a bit mad, but we’ll see. I’ll use this experience to see if I do it again.
I think he’ll be doing it again…
