Benedict Cumberbatch has opened up about a harrowing incident that nearly cost him his life.
In a recent interview with Variety, the 48-year-old actor recounted being kidnapped in 2004 while filming the BBC miniseries To the Ends of the Earth in South Africa.
The incident unfolded when Cumberbatch, then in his late 20s, and a group of friends were returning from a diving trip. A tire on their car blew out, forcing them to pull over. What happened next was a nightmare.
Six armed men ambushed the group and robbed and abducted them. The captors drove Cumberbatch and his friends around for hours before tying them up and forcing them to sit execution-style.
Miraculously, the kidnappers eventually decided to let them go and fled the scene, leaving them shaken but alive.
The Doctor Strange actor reflected on the near-death experience and explained how it changed his perspective on life.
“It gave me a sense of time, but not necessarily a good one,” he said. “It made me impatient to live a life less ordinary, and I’m still dealing with that impatience.”
He admitted that the traumatic incident gave him a craving for adrenaline. “The near-death stuff turbo-fueled all that. It made me go, ‘Oh, right, yeah, I could die at any moment.’ I was throwing myself out of planes, taking all sorts of risks. But apart from my parents, I didn’t have any real dependents at that point,” he said.
Now a father of three with wife Sophie Hunter, whom he married in 2014, the Marvel star says his priorities have shifted.
“The minute you have kids this sense of time sinks in far more profoundly,” he told the outlet. “My youngest is turning six tomorrow, and I’m like, ‘I will be in my 60s when he’s 21,’ you know? It’s crazy. It’s gone so fast. So there’s a huge shift in priorities, and it makes you value what you do with your life in a very different way.”
Despite the time that’s passed, the memory of the kidnapping remains vivid.
In a 2013 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Cumberbatch spoke about his fear during the terrifying ordeal.
“I was scared, really scared,” he said. “I said: ‘What are you going to do with us? Are you going to kill us?’ I was really worried that I was going to get raped or molested or just tortured or toyed with in some way, some act of control and savagery.’”
The horrifying experience left him with a newfound appreciation for life. “It really, really enriches your values in life,” Cumberbatch shared. “It’s incredibly important.
“I’ve looked over the edge; it’s made me comfortable with what lies beneath it. And I’ve accepted that that’s the end of all our stories,” he shared, reflecting on the choices he’s made since.
