It has been quite some time since anyone caught a glimpse of the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would cease to pursue acting, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his reputation expanded further.
The Legend of His Acting Method
Largely, this legend centers on his preferred approach to roles. As someone who famously disappears into the roles he plays – for example, while filming Lincoln, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” for the entire production – the world has grown more fascinated with how he works. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Did he consumed solely game he hunted for Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?
Currently, Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger regarding how method acting is perceived. “I’m a little cross these days when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems is meant to imply that a person’s acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he stated to the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or an experience that causes a severe discomfort or psychological strain. However, in the career of an actor, it has to principally be about the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
Frankly, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion and found himself shocked by the world that has been created mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as among the best performers to ever work, and your process includes headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (for Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by imitating your hero.
In other words, we exist in a landscape populated by half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they put into their roles. On the milder side of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became an Italian native for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character of the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, although Leto denied the most extreme claims. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed to get a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life to the utmost for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The foremost Method Guy currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the subject of a critical New Yorker profile, full of quotes from people who were worried for his behaviour (“The toll on himself that worries me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I remember [him] making others to react with exasperation,” stated an unnamed co-star).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘never intended to stop acting, truly’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. Each of these instances, to some extent, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable But Uphill Fight
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to demonstrate its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just start making more films. Surely we could all get behind that.
