Benedict Cumberbatch on fame, science and his new Radio 3 play, Copenhagen (RADIO TIMES)

EXCLUSIVE: we talk to the Sherlock star as he tackles Michael Frayn's modern classic with Simon Russell Beale and Greta Scacchi


Jack Seale
2:50 PM, 11 January 2013

Benedict Cumberbatch is at a point in his career where he needn't say yes to any project if he doesn't fancy it. The star of the biggest drama on British TV, Sherlock, he's proved himself on stage in Danny Boyle's innovative, award-sweeping reinvention of Frankenstein, and will become a proper Hollywood star this summer thanks to a major role in feverishly anticipated nerdgasm Star Trek into Darkness – a casting that director JJ Abrams says was "a formality" after one viewing of a Sherlock DVD.

At this rate, by 2014 Cumberbatch will simultaneously be playing Batman, Superman and James Bond – but even if that happens, on present form you can bet he'll still be a regular presence on good old BBC radio.

Christmas Day on Radio 4, just before the Queen's speech: there he was as the young Rumpole of the Bailey. Then on Wednesday, the Radio 4 sitcom Cabin Pressure came back for series 4 with Roger Allam, Stephanie Cole and, yes, Benedict Cumberbatch all returning as the staff of a tiny airline.

Now he's on the wireless yet again, playing German nuclear scientist Werner Heisenberg in a new version of Michael Frayn's modern classic play Copenhagen (Sunday 8.30pm Radio 3). The three-hander has a cast from the velvet-lined box inside the top drawer: Simon Russell Beale is Heisenberg's Danish former mentor Niels Bohr, while Greta Scacchi takes the ultimately crucial role of Bohr's wife Margrethe. Exalted company, but Cumberbatch is the big name.

The play premiered in 1998 and is a famously knotty beast, concerned with the details of atomic physics and the insoluble question of whether, when Heisenberg visited Bohr in 1941, he was trying to glean info that might help the Nazis get the bomb, or warning Bohr that Hitler wanted it. The three protagonists discuss this meeting after their deaths.

"I never saw a production of it," says Cumberbatch when RT visits during a break in recording at Broadcasting House in London. "So I'm probably going to piss a lot of people off who want to hear it the way they last heard it. There's no way I can impersonate that.

"These are such extraordinary people with so much on their shoulders. So much of what they did affected so many people. It's a ripe topic for drama and he's just a master, Crazy Phrasey Frayn. He's brilliant."


READ MORE:http://www.radiotimes.com/news/2013-01-11/benedict-cumberbatch-on-fame-science-and-his-new-radio-3-play-copenhagen

James McAvoy - 'Trance' trailer (DIGITAL SPY)Published Thursday, Jan 10 2013, 4:59am EST | By Simon Reynolds |

Danny Boyle's Trance has released its first trailer.

James McAvoy leads the cast of the heist thriller, playing an art auctioneer who gets drawn into a theft at his gallery.

Read more: http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/news/a449882/trance-trailer-james-mcavoy-falls-under-danny-boyles-spell.html#ixzz2HgUU96et 
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The Impossible: Is Ewan McGregor Finally Getting The Praise He Deserves? (CONTACT MUSIC)

Ewan McGregor's stunning turn in Juan Antonio Bayona's The Impossible is being lauded by critics left, right and center, with some suggesting it may be the Scottish actor's finest turn since Trainspotting. Of course, the disaster-epic is a very different film from Danny Boyle's 1996 classic, and it's the first time McGregor has played a father or family man.

The movie tells the true story of a family's experience of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami. It had its world premiere at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival on September 9, where it received critical acclaim. Following its full release, Empire magazine dubbed it a "rousing, superbly acted, no-holds-barred melodrama is a mighty feat of physical film making." Peter Bradshaw mused, "This film is not especially complex, and not subtle, but there is judgment and intelligence in the simple idea of survival being the most agonizing thing, and making survivor guilt the psychological aftershock of a shattering and irreparable blow."


READ MORE: http://www.contactmusic.com/news/the-impossible-is-ewan-mcgregor-finally-getting-the-praise-he-deserves_3433123

Danny Boyle’s Trance – First Images With James McAvoy, Rosario Dawson, Vincent Cassel – UPDATED With More Posted on December 27, 2012 by Brendon Connelly (BLEEDING COOL)

Danny Boyle‘s next is a do-over of Joe Ahearne‘s 2001 TV movie Trance, a noirish twister about an art theft gone wrong.

In the film version, James McAvoy plays the inside man at the gallery who gets a good bash on the head and forgets who he is – and where he’s hidden the painting. A hypnotherapist is called in to try and unlock these memories and the story is quickly revealed to be a blend of the real, the remembered and the imagined.

There’s a piece on the film in the current issue of Empire magazine – the iPad version of which is going for just 69p right now, so check it out for yourself.

READ MORE: http://www.bleedingcool.com/2012/12/27/danny-boyles-trance-first-images-with-james-mcavoy-rosario-dawson-vincent-cassel/