Actors learn a great many things when preparing for a role, and Benedict Cumberbatch recently revealed his knowledge from The Power of the Dog helped him bust up a bovine bunch for a scared family.
Today Insider reported the actor, who is up for an Oscar for his role as ranch owner Phil Burbank in the Netflix drama, told the audience on a coming episode of The Graham Norton Show about the incident. It happened at a beach in the U.K. he visited after wrapping the 2021 film. Cumberbatch encountered a group who was terrified of a herd of cattle on the field they had to cross to access the water and as a result, he used what he knew to make their day better.
“I came back from shooting the film in August and we were off to the beach. To get there we had to cross a field and in the field was a petrified family who just couldn’t move, they were frozen because of a herd of cows with calves. I thought ‘I can do this’ and just sort of parted the waves of cattle. The family was like, ‘that was incredible. Hey, aren’t you Sherlock?'”
Cumberbatch then joked it was a very un-Holmes-like thing to do. While filming the movie, director Jane Campion encouraged him to use method acting and stay in character throughout the process, so it looks like some parts of the experience stuck in his mind. We’ll find out next month if his dedication earns him his first Oscar statuette.