Benedict Cumberbatch reveals gruesome toll of learning to surf as adult

"I started in my forties, and I’m near the end of my forties, and I’m still feeling like I’m starting..."

Benedict Cumberbatch is one of the finer actors I have ever met. It was 2014 and at an Oscar afterparty in tony Beverly Hills. The Beverly Hills Hotel, if I’m not mistaken. In any case, I was there because Iouri Podladtchikov had just won Olympic gold at Sochi in the snowboard halfpipe, curb stomping America’s sweetheart Shaun White in front of his rabid countrymen. My wife his longtime agent. She snuck me in.

I was also there in Russia for the win. I have not been allowed back, since, getting visa viciously denied some five years later, but it was spectacular.

So there we three were standing in a corner of the Beverly Hills Hotel, in any case, when Benedict Cumberbatch approached in the most exquisitely polite manner. He was with a friend and dressed as dapper as any man I have ever seen. Cumberbatch was an up-and-coming full-blown star, at that point, having appeared in many films, including 12 Years a Slave, The Fifth Estate and The Desolation of Smaug. Later that year, he would become nominated for an Academy Award for his turn as Alan Turing in The Imitation Game.

“Excuse me, so sorry to intrude,” he said to wife and I before turning to Iouri and declaring, “I am such a fan. You were phenomenal in the Olympics.

Now, being Russian, did not showcase much emotion.

Continuing, Cumberbatch said, “My friends and I will be going out, after this, and, if you are not doing anything, we would love you to join.” Iouri gave an inconclusive response and the actor politely dismissed himself.

“That was Benedict Cumberbatch,” I told Iouri. “He is a fantastic actor.”

Iouri was unimpressed because he was wanting to go talk to Tara Reid or someone equally lower quality and that was that.

Benedict Cumberbatch and the Big Ouch

Well, it turns out that Benedict Cumberbatch took up surfing a year or two later, maybe inspired by me that evening as I was certainly showcasing a surfy elan, but as happens with adult learners, his journey has been marred by pain and struggle.

Appearing on the popular podcast Smartless, recently, the now-49-year-old revealed the terrible toll.

He had to go under the knife, you see, to fix a shoulder done wrong by our Sport of Queens.

“I started in my forties, and I’m near the end of my forties, and I’m still feeling like I’m starting,” Cumberbatch said, “But I had a short operation, so I haven’t done it at all for about six months. But I love it,” he went on before sharing, “I had a torn rotator cuff and then also a frozen shoulder on top of it, which I only found when I went into it to do the repair to the rotator, which was a complete tear. I lived with chronic pain for about a year and a half.

Hosts Jason Bateman, Will Arnett and Sean Hayes, intrigued, asked about this surfing thing to which Benedict Cumberbatch responded, “(Surfing) was a bit scary to begin with, but utterly magical and extraordinary. One of the best places on Earth to be, as it turned out. And there was a little right-hand break in Te Awanga in Hawke’s Bay. It was where I learned. I really fell in love with it.”

Left off was meeting a dashing surf journalist at The Beverly Hills Hotel that year or two earlier and becoming inspired.

“I fell in love with the view of the coastline” he continued. “I fell in love with that connection to the ocean, how present you are and the community as well. This extraordinary group of people where all is kind of forgiven – as long as you don’t take their wave. You know, the drug dealer would be there, and the head of the local police force would be there. Just all of human life was around you. I can’t explain to anyone who hasn’t surfed what that feeling is, of nature giving you a ride from somewhere out in the ocean towards the shoreline. It’s just magic when it works.”

What a guy that Benedict Cumberbatch is. Iouri Podladtchikov really blew it.