Fans are all excited to see "Sherlock" star Benedict Cumberbatch on the small screen once again on BBC1's New Year special.
According to the lead actor's recent interview, however, executive producers Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss' pitch for the Victorian-era episode wasn't met with much enthusiasm.
"The Imitation Game" star told The Independent that he wasn't raring to jump right into production for the special episode.
"In fact, I went, 'You're mad'," he revealed to the publication. "I genuinely didn't understand how they were going to get away with it."
Thankfully, Moffat and Gatiss seemed to have been persistent in their idea because they managed to wear the actor down and convinced him to go into production despite his very busy schedule.
"And then I got the more detailed pitch and I thought, 'OK, this is going to be great fun', And it really is," the Academy Award nominee later conceded.
In the three years that he's starred in "Sherlock," Benedict Cumberbatch had been keeping a more modern image of the detective. When he started filming the Victorian-era Sherlock Holmes, however, he reportedly enjoyed turning into a gentleman.
"It's so nice to play him in his era," he continued to divulge. "The things that are asked of me in the modern version, the sense that this is a man clearly slightly out of his time... to put him back in the era he was written in originally is just a joy. It feels easier."
"And then there are things I tried to impose on the modern version, like his stature and physicality - a lot of that's done [in the Victorian version] by the clothing, the collars, the deerstalker and cape and pipe and things."
Another perk of doing the one-off "Sherlock" special, according to Benedict Cumberbatch is the fact that he could finally cut his hair.
The modern Sherlock Holmes, like Jon Snow, had a notable head of dark curls that he couldn't cut off because it had already become a distinguishing aspect of the character.
"I was thrilled," the father-of-one noted. "At last, I could get a haircut."
