By Lacy Baugher for Actors and Actresses on November 30th, 2015

Benedict Cumberbatch Imitating Otters Will Brighten Up Your Day

Benedict Cumberbatch as an otter.

We all know Benedict Cumberbatch is pretty perfect, right?

In the past year or so, the Sherlock star has done Shakespeare, read love letters, filmed a new episode of the world’s most popular detective show, gotten cast as the lead in a Marvel movie, been nominated for an Oscar, read a poem for the funeral of a long-dead British monarch, and generally been a great sport about the approximately one million internet memes about him that are going around at any given moment.

The most famous Cumberbatch-related internet phenomenon is probably the whole “Otters Who Look Like Benedict Cumberbatch” thing, which matched photos of otters with Cumberbatch sporting similar facial expressions.  It kind of became a thing online, and Cumberbatch has been asked about it before, which is only part of what makes this clip so incredibly awesome.

Cumberbatch appeared on BBC One’s The Graham Norton Show last week, along with actor Johnny Depp. The two were there to help promote the UK release of their movie Black Mass, which stars Depp as notorious gangster James “Whitey” Bulger and Cumberbatch as his brother Billy. But all of this is incredibly irrelevant next to the amazingly silly bit Norton got Cumberbatch to do in the middle of the interview, and that is real life impersonations of otters.

After Norton explained to Depp the origins of this whole otter phenomenon, he then got Cumberbatch to recreate a series of otter photos himself as part of the show, including an angry otter, and one that’s cuddling with a giant teddy bear.

Words are not enough to do this justice, so just watch the hilarity unfold for yourself: 

 

Seriously, when will someone let this man do a real comedy? When?  (At the very least can someone get on making an otter plush inspired by Cumberbatch? Or something?) 

By Lacy Baugher for Actors and Actresses on November 30th, 2015
Lacy Baugher

Lacy's love of British TV is embarrassingly extensive, but primarily centers around evangelizing all things Doctor Who, and watching as many period dramas as possible.

Digital media type by day, she also has a fairly useless degree in British medieval literature, and dearly loves to talk about dream poetry, liminality, and the medieval religious vision. (Sadly, that opportunity presents itself very infrequently.) York apologist, Ninth Doctor enthusiast, and unabashed Ravenclaw. Say hi on Threads or Blue Sky at @LacyMB. 

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