Benedict Cumberbatch is at Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea Film Festival this week for the Mena premiere of John Crowley’s tragic romance We Live In Time, starring Garfield and Florence Pugh, which he exec produced under his SunnyMarch banner.

After hitting the red carpet in the port city of Jeddah on Monday evening in the company of Garfield, Cumberbatch was in the spotlight in his own right in an on-stage conversation today.

One among 30 conversations by A-listers this festival, Cumberbatch’s talk was by far the best attended so far, with fans of his performances as Dr Strange in the Marvel Cinematic Universe filling the auditorium.

“These are big sandpits. They’re grand gestures. When they’re really good, they carry something of the Zeitgeist,” he said of Marvel productions. “They speak to us of our culture. They’re kind of myths of now, and they are so much fun to do,...