He’s speaking to me from his air-conditioned hotel room in Soho at the peak of the summer heat. Few doubt that climate breakdown was a major cause of those scorchers, with nature, farming and water supplies all placed under huge strain. By midsummer, according to a report co-authored by the Met Office, there were 2,700 excess deaths in England and Wales due to the searing heat.
But for Cumberbatch, in a bittersweet way, the record-breaking temperatures have come at a good time. The actor has been on a tour to promote his new documentary, How to Live on Earth. It features Cumberbatch delivering monologues from the cavernous halls of the Natural History Museum in London, in between short films showing how activists, scientists and even chefs are learning a “new way to live on Earth” – one that could stop humanity damaging it.
Cumberbatch has spent the last two decades trying to reframe his relationship with the planet: he’s tried to live more gently on Earth and became vegan. However, this was a problem during the shooting of The Courier, in which he plays captured British spy Greville Wynne, who languishes in a Russian jail. You need to eat lean meat.’ And I was like, ‘I’m vegan!’” No fibre for two weeks must have been tough on the bowels?
But his experience on The Courier is just one way that working in films can challenge even the most committed eco-campaigner. Cumberbatch works with the Green Rider movement, which asks actors to make cutting pollution and emissions during filming a condition of taking part. So yeah, it’s scaling up – and everyone I speak to about it in my community is on board.” So, he’s ditched veganism, but would he get a private jet?
The fashion industry is a bigger polluter than aviation, and the food industry massively. That’s all of us, that’s everyone.” Not just movie stars. The 50-year-old has long been an environmental campaigner.
He visited the Extinction Rebellion protests in 2019 and has been dismayed by the recent government crackdowns on climate protests, with long sentences given to people who have blocked roads and smashed windows for the cause. Cumberbatch is keen to highlight the film’s positive message and, unlike most environmental documentaries, it does (almost) have a happy ending. It follows some remarkable people, from Indigenous activists trying to protect salmon from a dam, to Barack Obama’s former White House chef who is experimenting with alternative proteins.
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