Interview with Benedict Cumberbatch
Category
🎥
Short filmTranscript
00:00Now, Benedict, to your end, we not only get to see you play Vincent, but we also hear your voice as Eric, his creation, this big walk around puppet monster.
00:10And I was very curious, what part of your previous mocap work on the Hobbit trilogy do you think best prepared you for playing a puppeteer?
00:18And what was the greatest lesson you learned while doing specific prep for Eric?
00:22None of it, because, well, a bit of voice work, I suppose, although that was vocoded or whatever you call it.
00:28That was mixed a lot, whereas mine is as deep as I can get it, as Eric.
00:33And I didn't do any, the hand puppet work that you see me doing with Bug at the beginning of the show is very different to mocap work.
00:42Mocap work is a sort of extension of you via an avatar, so it is your kind of, your movements are creating the image.
00:49This is, it sort of becomes real at the end of your arm, if that makes sense.
00:53It's just slightly different, and you're looking at your work, you're seeing it on a screen.
00:58You're aware of yourself and what it's creating.
01:00It's a slightly different sensation.
01:03So no, it didn't help at all.
01:05It felt like a new skill and a really difficult one to master.
01:10So we did as best as we could.
01:12I mean, I have to say my team on that show were amazing, both the real puppeteers,
01:16but also the actors playing the gang in Good Day Sunshine.
01:20They were extraordinary, and they just threw themselves into it.
01:22We all kind of fell a bit in love with it and became a bit obsessed.
01:25Simon went out with a little puppet on a couple of club nights, I hear.
01:31I wasn't part of that experience.
01:32I was just, you know, talking away like that.
01:36But it's joyous.
01:38It is joyous, despite the rich, dark sort of depths of this shadow self that is made real in Eric,
01:44of Vincent's kind of odyssey through hell, really.
01:48It is a joyous thing to be around.
01:51Eric, as encapsulated by Ollie, who's actually in the suit, was a real presence.
01:55All of us were kids when he was on set.
01:58I had a wonderful repartee with him, improvising lines.
02:01He was as quick an actor as he was a puppeteer.
02:04Very, very smart, brilliant performer, brilliant actor, and also a brilliant puppeteer.
02:08So it was a real entity for me to play off.
02:11And, yeah, I enjoyed that enormously.