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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/38190
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

I think it's a bad idea.

1. Personally, I have no idea who "Benedict Cumberbatch" is. Maybe I've seen him on TV or in movies and don't remember the name, or maybe I've never seen him. The odds are that many of your readers don't know who he is either. If you should be so fortunate that your book is still being read many years from now, there might well be a whole new generation who have never heard of this actor. Hey, I've talked to young people who don't know who the president was 30 years ago, never mind some actor. Celebrities tend to come and go pretty quickly from public attention. Just ask 90% of the actors who thought they were hot stuff 30 years ago.

The point being, for anyone who isn't familiar with the actor, your reference will just be confusing. Looks like who? What does he look like?

1. For readers who ARE familiar with the actor, dragging in his name will bring all sorts of other associations. Is your hero like Cumberbatch in EVERY way? Once you mention the actor's name, readers are going to be thinking of his mannerisms, his personality from roles they saw him play on TV, etc. Do all of these fit your character? Will readers who remember him from a movie where he played a crafty villain think think of your character very differently from readers who remember the actor from a movie where he played a clean and upright hero and different still from readers who remember him from a movie where he played a pathetic man in need of help? (I have no idea if Mr Cumberbatch played any such roles, just examples.)

What about things about the actor or the characters he plays that haven't even happened at the time you write your story? I can imagine someone 10 years ago writing a character who is a lovable, funny family man, and so he says, "He was like Bill Cosby." And then it comes out that Bill Cosby is accused of sexual assault. The reader is left with an image of a creepy stalker in his head instead of the lovable, funny family man.

1. As a reader, it would strike me as lazy. You don't have the creativity to invent your own character, so you just steal someone else's. You don't have the skill to flesh out an interesting character, so you just say "hey he's just like this guy that maybe you've heard of". I'm not saying that you ARE lazy, uncreative, and skill-less, but that doing this would give that impression to many readers.

Original score: 4