BENEDICT CHOCOBATCH.

TV’s “dishiest drama actor” gets a chocolate makeover for Easter

• Benedict Cumberbatch voted dishiest TV drama actor, beating other home-grown talents including David Tennant and Idris Elba
• Six foot sculpture made out of 40kg’s of chocolate will be at Westfield Stratford City on Good Friday 
• Created to celebrate launch of TV channel Drama on uktvplay.co.uk

#chocobatch

A life-size chocolate sculpture of the acclaimed actor Benedict Cumberbatch has been unveiled following a national poll which named the star as Britain’s dishiest TV drama actor.

The Sherlock star beat off strong competition from Broadchurch’s David Tennant, rumoured potential James Bond Idris Elba and Aidan Turner, current star of Poldark to claim the tasty title ahead of the forthcoming Easter weekend break.

The research, which surveyed 2000 British women, and subsequent chocolate sculpture, were specially commissioned to celebrate today’s launch of TV channel Drama on UKTV’s on demand service, uktvplay.co.uk.

The top ten dishiest TV drama actors:

A crew of eight worked on the construction of Cumberbatch’s confectionary counterpart; a process which took over 250 man hours. The team, including a sculptor, chocolatier and model maker began by interrogating the actor’s measurements and assessing images from red carpet appearances to help them perfect Benedict’s look and create an accurate model even down to the smallest detail.

A suited and booted homage was chosen to reflect the star’s numerous red carpet appearances over the last year and a base model was painstakingly sculpted before the final model was cast entirely out of luxuriously thick, hollow Belgian milk chocolate – weighing in at 40kg. Once the chocolate had set, the team perfected and defined Benedict’s distinctive features, to ensure the star looked red carpet ready.

Lead sculptor Tim Simpson said: “You can’t rush perfection. Benedict has such a distinctive look that it was a challenge but a pleasure, to recreate him in chocolate. A secret combination of methods ensured we got a great likeness – we’re sure his legions of fans will approve!”

Benedict Cumberbatch will next be seen on Drama in Silent Witness, 12th April at 9pm, whilst James Nesbitt and Rupert Penry-Jones also feature this season. Sean Bean stars in Sharpe, which is on the channel this summer. Viewers will be able to enjoy watching Damian Lewis in The Forsyte Saga and David Tennant in United on uktvplay.co.uk from today.

Adrian Wills, General Manager of Drama said: “With Drama launching on UKTV Play this Easter, it was the perfect opportunity to pay homage to the fantastic talent we have on the channel, including of course, Benedict Cumberbatch. Hopefully he’ll make it through Easter weekend in one piece.”

A life-size sculpture of Benedict Cumberbatch made out of chocolate was unveiled today to celebrate the launch of Drama on UKTV’s on demand service uktvplay.co.uk from 1^st April.

The sculpture will be at Westfield Stratford City on Friday 3^rd April. To follow the action, use the hashtag #chocobatch