Benedict Cumberbatch got nicotine poisoning three times while filming Jane Campion’s The Power Of The Dog
In order to really get into character, Cumberbatch opted out of using herbal cigarettes
Aux News The Power of the Dog
In preparation of his performance as the sadistic and repressed rancher Phil Burbank in Jane Campion’s The Power Of The Dog, Benedict Cumberbatch opted to take on all of his character’s hobbies and habits, including cigarette smoking. His dedication to method acting resulted in the actor developing nicotine poisoning on three separate occasions during filming.
In the film’s source material—the 1967 novel by Thomas Savage—the author emphasizes Burbank’s nicotine habit, adding the detail that the rancher prefers his cigarettes “perfectly rolled with one-hand.” Cumberbatch felt compelled to roll the same way with real tobacco. He used none of the easy, nicotine-free herbal cigarettes everyone else uses during filming.
“That was really hard,” Cumberbatch tells Esquire. “Filterless rollies, just take after take after take. I gave myself nicotine poisoning three times. When you have to smoke a lot, it genuinely is horrible.”
In the novel, Savage further describes the elder Burbank as “a great reader, a taxidermist, skilled at braiding rawhide and horsehair, a solver of chess problems, a smith and metalworker, a collector of arrowheads (even fashioning arrowheads himself with greater skill than any Indian), a banjo player, a fine writer, a builder of hay-stacking beaver-slide derricks, a vivid conversationalist,” all of which Cumberbatch took to heart.
He went to work on developing this set of rugged Western skills for Burbank. The actor learned how to carve out derricks, worked on braiding, roping, ironmongery, hide-treating, hay-stacking, whistling, whittling, and even plucking the banjo. Prior to filming in New Zealand, Cumberbatch attended an intense ranch training in Montana.
In his full-method approach to Burbank, Cumberbatch learned how to castrate a bull, refused to speak to co-star Kirsten Dunst on set, and maintained a low drawl when speaking. However, to really capture Burbank’s aura, the actor chose not to bathe.
“I wanted that layer of stink on me. I wanted people in the room to know what I smelt like,” Cumberbatch tells Esquire. “It was hard, though. It wasn’t just in rehearsals. I was going out to eat and meet friends of Jane and stuff. I was a bit embarrassed by the cleaner, in the place I was living.”
Campion brought the cast to New Zealand three weeks before shooting started with plenty of time for rehearsals. In a conversation with IndieWire, the director commended Cumberbatch’s dedication to the role.
“He had to do castrating, and learn how to do everything,” Campion said of Cumberbatch during Telluride. “It’s such a big step for him. It’s a fantastic demonstration of his capacity and his courage.”
Cumberbatch stars in The Power Of The Dog alongside Dunst, Jesse Plemons, and Kodi Smit-McPhee. The film will debut in select theaters on November 17 and is set to arrive on Netflix on December 1.
120 Comments
My dear boy, why don’t you just try acting?
LMAO I was thinking of the exact same quote. Such nonsense. You’re an artist, use your imagination, for crying out loud.
Great minds – I was reminded of that delightful anecdote as well!
Agreed! Great minds remember the same anecdotes!
Of course that is a quote from a guy who didn’t really feel he was “acting” unless he was vomiting from nerves before going on.
Let’s hope he never takes a role as a meth addict.
The “birth” scene for his turn as Frankenstein’s creature probably comes close to what that portrayal would look like.
Benedict on meth. LOL!
He recently played a brain surgeon turned wizard, I don’t even want to know how he got into character for that.
Or that he should repeat his role as Sherlock Holmes and hid addiction to the 7% Solution.
well yall get mad when a straight person plays a gay person so . . .
I can hear Sir Larry’s wheedling voice….
“I . . . haff . . . no . . . son . . .”
It would be cool if my job afforded me the time and resources to go off and learn a bunch of random skills I’d probably never get the opportunity to do otherwise, but the smoking and lack of bathing is unnecessary.
THANK YOU!
You know what’s method? cancer.
Blacklung Cancerbatch
Perfect rollies with one hand? That’s impressive.
I don’t know, I tried wearing my rollie on two hands but the band broke
Damn right it is
I’ve been putting on weight over the years for my role… now I just need to become an actor, find out what that role is, and book it.
It’s a Brando biopic for me, going from young and sexy and full of potential to bloated and insane. Not sure how we’re going to get the “young” footage at this point, but I guess they can CGI anything these days.
Conservating mass.
Fat Fuck 2: The Fattening. and you’d better be quick, my agent is already in talks with the producers.
If smoking rollies, being rude to your co-workers, and stinking is what makes a great actor, I know some people in my neighborhood who deserve Oscars.
Now play Van Gogh, idiot.
He did.
I’ll be damned, he did! My cheap jibe has become a learning moment. I wonder if he played him as some kind of intense oddball genius who delivers all his lines in a superior mutter?
My 12 year old says “cringe” is not cool to say anymore but that picture is cringe. Red hair! Beard! Sunflowers! Sunshine! Put some freaking swirls and moons and stars in there, why dontcha?
Is there a scene where he realizes the only thing extending above the horizon into the heavens is a steeple? Because that would be profound.
I was wondering that myself. Does having a famous picture with sunflowers in it mean he had sunflowers somewhere in view at all times? Maybe he can play Leonardo and always have a subtly-smiling woman looking on in the background.
Can it be Aubrey Plaza? People seem to like her.
“My 12 year old says “cringe” is not cool to say anymore”
Are the youths finally saying cringe worthy again? It’s been bugging me.
More like Van Gogh fuck yourself.
I think you meant your cheap jab?
Was he eating the cigarettes? Was he drinking bottles of vape juice? Or did he feel a little sick the way that anyone who doesn’t smoke would feel after smoking a while.It’s next to impossible to get nicotine poisoning just from smoking.
… did the rest of the cast appreciate getting the second hand smoke from this? Movie sets are workplaces, not sure what the rules are in New Zealand but in most areas it’s kind of illegal to smoke in a workplace.
Like most real cowboys, he only smoked in the bathroom.
I use to work with a guy who was a long time smoker that fucked up his body enough with it that he could not shit, if he wasn’t smoking, but ironically smoking always made him have to shit.
Did he shit his pants while watching Jim Carrey in The Mask?
method acting sounds like an excuse to just be a dick to people
That’s because it is
It’s this “I’m an artist, so deal with it” thing that allows assholes to be assholes because they’re tortured geniuses. There’s something to the rarity of female actors who go all method. It just wouldn’t be tolerated.
It’s especially baffling when they have kids and families.
All I could think during that whole article was “his poor wife.” Reeking of cigarettes and BO? You are kindly invited to get the hell out of my bed, sir!
the bit about not talking to Dunst on set is misleading- in the NYTimes article Dunst talks about how they went to dinner together every week and how wonderfully nice he was. It was ONLY on set that he didn’t talk to her because only on set was he fully in character at all times.
DUNST!
Well, we all know he’s Benedict since birth…
Sigh…goddamnit
and to not bathe, for some reason.
Theater nerd rant incoming! It’s especially egregious when you learn that “the Method” as most people know it is based off of Lee Strasburg’s mistranslation and perversion of the writings of Konstantin Stanislavki.
In short, the Stanislavki method was a common sense approach to getting actors to connect their own emotional past to the part. Strasburg turned it into this ornate process of “living as the character”, which Stanislavki actually advocated against in his writings (it’s just that nobody in the English speaking world picked up on that nuance until his book ‘An Actor Prepares’ was retranslated from Russian in 2008.) Nowadays actors are taught with the authentic method, but there’s still generations of egotistical Strasburg zealots running around… /endtheaternerdrant
Its getting paid to do a fully immersive LARP.
I’ll give Daniel Day-Lewis a pass because he really created some truly transcendent performances. He’s a genius and geniuses tend to work with whatever rituals manage to unlock that incredible thing in their brain. Of course there will always be shallow imitators like, say, Jared Leto, who seem to do it mainly for attention and it ends up doing very little to help their performance.I think Cumberbatch might fall somewhere in between the two. I think he might stick to his methods in earnest and with noble intentions, but I don’t think it’s all that necessary. I think his light probably shines the brightest if he doesn’t try so hard.
Agreed. Day-Lewis is a known oddball who, for the last 25 years, seemed to gravitate to roles involving tortured and intense men. He just kind of is what he is. Meanwhile I can’t imagine Cumberbatch stays in character as Dr. Strange for a good part of his professional life.Leto can just get the fuck out. I’ve established a full boycott of anything he’s in, because he wrecks it.
That’s a helluva tagline: He’s not Daniel-Day Lewis, but fortunately he’s not quite Jared Leto.
Far from the worst endorsement that one could receive!
I’ll believe method acting is a thing when an actor turns around, asks who the hell all these people are and why a camera is on then falls to the floor in an existential “my life is a lie” breakdown. As one would do upon the realization that one is a fictional character.
And it all came from a mistranslation. Lee Strasberg completely butchered Antonin Stanislavski’s acting system by only presenting a single step of the process (& the step that Stanislavski himself considered the least important).
Anyone tell him that you can’t smell movies?
John Waters?
Smell-O-Vision, though.
Love to see the mononymous Dunst getting more roles, even without a first name!
Learn to bend reality like a real Master of the Mystic Arts or go home you hack.
At least develop a morphine addiction and fuck Martin Freeman before you do another terrible season of Sherlock
What a pussy. I thought British’s started smoking when they were like 3.
You’re thinking of the French.
2.
A lot of effort for a film no ones going to watch
“a collector of arrowheads (even fashioning arrowheads himself with greater skill than any Indian)“
Huh, well that’s a weirdly racist aside.
Well that was dumb as hell.
Nicotine poisoning? Give me a break.
I think he’s got the black lung, pop.
Benedict Bumboclaat
“[…] a great reader, a taxidermist, skilled at braiding rawhide and horsehair, a solver of chess problems, a smith and metalworker, a collector of arrowheads (even fashioning arrowheads himself with greater skill than any Indian), a banjo player, a fine writer, a builder of hay-stacking beaver-slide derricks, a vivid conversationalist,”a top-notch ballroom dancer, proficient at sculpting busts in the medium of soap, a curator of large mammals, a Guinness World Record holder (in long-distance cherry pit spitting), an owl whisperer, a Michelin star chef, a distiller of fine bourbon, a stigmatized thaumaturge, and a connoisseur of baudy limericks.
an award-winning phlebotomist, forty percent zinc by weight, paddled all the way up the Mississippi, smarter than the average bear, expert in Roman military history, Hayley Atwell’s godfather, more human than human, transparent to radio emissions, knows where missing socks go, immune to lava, and caught the silver dollar Washington threw across the Potomac
a pinball warlock, a vigilant straightener of stacked freesheet newspapers at the train station, the original Mister Boombastic, a daredevil chopper pilot, a three-time kidney donor (don’t ask), a five-time SNL host, a Juggalo jigolo, an effervescent after-dinner speaker, a man who ain’t afraid of no ghost, the man, the machine, Street Hawk, a lethal spin bowler, and no mean slouch in the sheets, neither.
I was in agreement up until you mentioned Mister Boombastic. There is only one, and will only ever be one, Mister Boombastic.
An advertising genius, a Korean War hero, a wearer of Brooks Brothers suits, a man who drives better drunk than you do sober, money means nothing to him, he grew up in a brothel, a stealer of identities, he on more than one occasion has disappeared to California with no repercussions, he could be Batman for all we know.
Chip Driver is either a private eye, or the quarterback for the Chicago Bears, or the “world’s strongest president. “ He cannot be all three!
a man who won’t cop out when there’s danger all about, a complicated man but no one understands him but his woman, who’ll stick his neck out for his brother man . . .
I almost pooped myself at “transparent to radio emissions”. Hehehe. Bravo.
I hope the beavers at least enjoyed the slide
You started a most delightful thread here. Good work all around.
I’m laughing my ass off imagining Bicycle Cummerbund trying to go all method on the whole thing.
has depression and anxiety
“My dear boy, why not try acting?” — Sir Laurence Olivier (after hearing about Dustin Hoffman’s method acting bullshit while shooting Marathon Man (1976))
As someone who’s unfortunately addicted to smoking, what an ass
All this and it’s not even a real movie, it’s just on Netflix.
Now that he can take a shower, I hope he doesn’t get
“(even fashioning arrowheads himself with greater skill than any Indian)“I hate this
A white guy can do anything better than anyone, is kind of what I get from fiction writers of a certain era.
I know, especially since the documented history of Europe clearly shows that no one crafted arrowheads and exclusively used suction cups until America was colonized.
Shouldn’t be that difficult though – people from India are not to my knowledge especially renowned for their skill at making arrowheads.
Well that’s just nitpicking, isn’t it?
How dare you! Ramayan, Mahabarath or any Bollywood movie have showed that Indian are better at making arrowhead in the form of chakra, snake and pigeon?
I gave up smoking two days ago so nicotine poisoning sounds truly delicious right now.
What a pussy.
I fucking hate shit like this. I love you Benedict, but quit this shit and just act.
Such a poser, If he was a real method actor he would have pretended he was a wizard for real when he played Doctor Strange
Plus, you know, done a decent American accent.
He was supposed to be American?
His dedication to method acting resulted in the actor developing nicotine poisoning on three separate occasions during filming. What they call “dedication” and “method” in the film industry, we call it being a toxic, narcissistic piece of shit.In his full-method approach to Burbank, Cumberbatch learned how to castrate a bull, refused to speak to co-star Kirsten Dunst on set, and maintained a low drawl when speaking. However, to really capture Burbank’s aura, the actor chose not to bathe.I wanted that layer of stink on me. I wanted people in the room to know what I smelt like,” Cumberbatch tells Esquire.
“It was hard, though. It wasn’t just in rehearsals. I was going out to
eat and meet friends of Jane and stuff. I was a bit embarrassed by the
cleaner, in the place I was living.”I stand by my earlier statement.
Yeah, you don’t sound awful at all.
I don’t think one can call “smoking to the point of feeling unwell” nicotine poisoning. Thats a whole class of trainwreck that happens when people fuck around with nicotine juice for vapes.My nicotine use doubled when I quite smoking because nicotine is wonderful, and oral ingestion of it is safe, legal, and convenient (i have no idea why anyone vapes this, its fucking dumb and sketchy as hell in most cases).
Many people have no particular effects of chemical addiction to nicotine but need the mechanical habit of putting something to your mouth and inhaling it.
Well jeez if thats what they need surely they should just be giving blow jobs behind the 7-11 like the rest of ….us?
That just doesn’t hit the same
So . . . try to suck some dick on the way to the parking lot?
THIRTY SEVEN!?!
Clearly, actors should not talk about their process in public. People always get the vapors.
“I wanted that layer of stink on me. I wanted people in the room to know what I smelt like,” This is the very definition of “don’t make your process my process.”
I worked with a kid who didn’t shower or wash his uniform. His smell overpowered the dead mouse in the office wall.
Sounds like he’s really hoping this will be his break-out role so people won’t just remember him as the Wizard Guy, Sherlock and the Guy Who Ruined Star Trek.
This Engelbert Humperdinck fellow seems like a real pill.
I can’t play the “back in my day” card because Benedict Cumberbatch is older than me, but naw you fucking dolt, unless you’re chugging vape juice or inhaling cigar smoke 50 minutes of every 60 for an entire workday, you haven’t experienced nicotine poisoning, you got an upset belly.
Benedict Cumberbatch opted to take on all of his character’s hobbies and habits, including cigarette smoking. His dedication to method acting resulted in the actor developing nicotine poisoning on three separate occasions during filming.That’s dumb and method acting is dumb.
Thundercats are great!
tobacco is just the most disgusting thing on earth
I fucking hate being alive on earth because my mom smoked while pregnant, everyone smoked all the time for the first 12 years of my life, and even today you can’t walk a block without some hobo-stinking, entitled scumbag stinking up a doorway
I wish i could make tobacco just disappear…. then watch all the addicts just lose their shit. tear themselves and each other to pieces with withdrawal
From just reading the beginning of the article, it sure seems like he didn’t have to do it, so, who cares he had a hard time doing it. 🙄