Benedict Cumberbatch’s Fans Lead To Increased Security For Play

When Marlon Brando took to the New York stage as Stanley in A Streetcar Named Desire all the way back in 1947, he electrified the acting world with his unrestrained brutish sexuality. Legends persist to this day that women threw their hotel room keys at the stage, he was that good. We don’t know what the deal with backstage security for Marlon was, but we’re sure his ghost may sympathise with Benedict Cumberbatch, whose role as Hamlet in the Barbican Theatre in London has seen the institution beef up their security detail. The Cumberbitches have landed.

The Daily Mail reports that the current security can’t cope with the hordes of fans flocking to get a glimpse of the Sherlock actor playing a descending-into-madness Danish prince. Fans are travelling from all over the world, having secured tickets back in January when they sold out in minutes. Every morning 30 €10 tickets go on sale to the general queueing public. The 39-year-old is taking the lead role in Lyndsey Turner’s adaptation of the classic play and will be on stage until October.

The theatre has had to email ticketholders to say Benedict won’t be signing autographs after the show, according to The Guardian. Nor will he be accepting presents from well-meaning fans. So stop knitting that intricate pewter scarf that you think will look perfect with his green/blue eyes. (Benedict Cumberbatch fact: his eye colour varies depending on the light, this is because of a condition called sectoral heterochromia. You’re now essentially an opthamologist.) Benedict is in this for the Shakespeare, not the fame.

It’s a pretty busy time for Benedict to be dealing with his unrelentingly supportive fans. The actor got married earlier this year and welcomed his first child with wife Sophie Hunter, a son in June.

Have you got a ticket to Hamlet?

Via The Daily Mail?