Benedict Cumberbatch needs to work on his banjo game

But he does know how to whittle. And stack hay. And paint cats. And if you ask nicely, he might make a shoe for your horse. With four new films ready for release, from Marvel spectaculars to intense dramas, cinema’s most distinctive—and best prepared—leading man has had a productive pandemic.

- JOHNNY DAVIS

Benedict Cumberbatch is a diligent researcher of the lives of his characters, both fictional and non-fictional. On the face of it, the story of Greville Wynne, the character he plays in his most recent film, The Courier, offered rich pickings. But there was a problem. A real-life businessman recruited by MI6 during the Cold War as a go-between with Soviet asset Oleg Penkovsky, the late Wynne had left behind two books detailing his exploits. Unfortunately, he was a compulsive liar. Much of what he described was either wrong or simply couldn’t have taken place. The Courier, then, needed to be one Hollywood biopic that relied less on its source material to try to get to the truth. (When it comes to espionage, it turns out you don’t know who to trust.)

So how best to get a handle on the man?

“It’s weird,” Cumberbatch says. “Things come out of leftfield that pull you in the direction of understanding a character.”

With Greville Wynne it was his tie.

“I said, ‘This tie’s in every single photograph of him. It’s what he wears on his show trial, it’s what he wears when he comes out of prison, it’s what he wears before he was ever embroiled in this whole thing.’ I researched it. It was a University of Nottingham Engineering Club tie. He was never part of any club. It’s a uniform. He’s projecting a personality. It’s an act. A bit of showmanship.”