It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 that he would no longer work as an actor, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. However, in his absence, his reputation has only grown.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend centers on his favored style of working. As someone who famously immerses himself in his characters – for example, during the Lincoln biopic, he had the director call him “Mr President” for the entire production – the world has become more fascinated with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Did he consumed solely animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
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Currently, Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. He is taking this chance to express his frustration regarding how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “People tends to focus on superficial details of the work, and those details typically include some sort of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or mental instability. But of course, in the life for a performer, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”
A World of Imitators
Frankly, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion only to discover aghast at the acting community that has developed in his image. If you’re regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your process includes striking a prop until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
Essentially, we exist in a landscape populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to demonstrate the extensive degree of effort they invest in their roles. On the milder side of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself into the role of the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to his castmates. These items, according to various accounts, range from dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, though the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they succeeded to get a feature-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost Method Guy at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from people who were either concerned for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself concerns me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I remember him causing others to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).
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There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, years following the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication with which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
A Noble But Uphill Battle
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle might not be enough to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Maybe if he wants to remind people what method acting is, or to show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making additional movies. Surely everyone would support that idea.
