Hopefully by the time you read this, the devastation has passed and you’re able to function as you normally would after hearing that Benedict Cumberbatch is now engaged.
The Twitter reaction to the celebrity engagement has been exactly what you’d expect. Thousands of Cumberb**tches wailing via the use of memes, proclaiming their “devastation”; at the otherwise happy news.
So who is this women who’s stolen Smaug’s heart? As we do when all of our fantasy boyfriends get hitched, we take a long hard look at who’s taking him off the market.
The short form is this: Sophie Hunter acts, directs operas, sings (in French) and basically is every beautiful English incarnation of womanhood we think of, when we think of sharing a garden picnic with Cumberbatch.
Hello Oxford University Diploma.
That’s right, the soon-to-be Mrs. Cumberbatch has a degree in Modern Languages from Oxford University. Sophie studied French and Italian before enrolling in the prestigious Jacques Lecog School Of Theatre in Paris.
According to Cumberbatch’s sister, any girlfriend of her brother’s would need to be one “pretty smart cookie to keep up with him.”; A reason she thinks is why “he has trouble with girlfriends,”; she told The Sun in 2012.
She Can Act.
Let’s talk about that acting career shall we? Hunter has a number of film and TV credits to her name. From Torchwood to Midsomer Murders, Hunter has held her own alongside British stars like David Tennant in the 2004 short film Traffic Warden, shared the screen with Reese Witherspoon in Vanity Fair and of course her own fiancé Benedict Cumberbatch in 2010’s Burlesque Fairytales.
Hard not to fall in love when you’re playing the Annabel Blythe-Smith to Cumberbatch’s Henry Clark. Watch the pair in action at the 1:30 mark.
Award-Winning Theatre Director? You bet.
Hunter is arguably better known for her work as a theatre director than her time spent in front of the camera. Hunter took the helm of the North America run of the experimental play 69 South in 2012. No big deal right? Well, the talented beauty basically revolutionized theatre, dramatizing the near-fatal voyage of Antarctic explorer Ernest Shackleton through the use of performers on stilts and marionette puppets.
That award we keep toting around? It was the Samuel Beckett award for writing and directing. Hunter won it in 2007 for her own play, The Terrific Electric at the Barbican Centre.
And just in case that’s not enough, Sophie’s directed a number of Operas, including the 2011 New York production of Benjamin Britten’s opera The Rape of Lucretia and the 2011 African tour of Mozart’s The Magic Flute for the arts charity Opera for Change.
Not only does she run theatres, she founds them as well. Sophie Hunter co-founded the Lacuna Theatre Company, is an artistic director of the Boiler Room, an associate director at the Broadhurst Theatre and to round out the list, she is a collaborating director and dramaturge on marionette and puppetry with the Phantom Limb Company.
She Sings. In French.
Guess what? Not only can Sophie direct Operas, she might actually be able to star in them as well. Hunter is a talented pianist and singer, who’s had a music career of her own. She recorded a French language album with Robbie Williams’ collaborator Guy Chambers in 2005 called The Isis Project.
She’s Old Fashioned, Just Like He Is.
The fact that Benedict flew to Edinburgh to ask Sophie’s mother’s permission is not lost on us. The actor really upped his swoonworthy factor with one single act and we’re sure that she loves it as well.
Sophie’s spotlight profile lists her skills as athletics, horse-jumping, horse-riding, running, sailing, swimming, tennis and yoga. So basically Benedict Cumberbatch’s soon-to-be wife is just as old school British as he is.
