It’s been a long while since the public caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer work as an actor, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his reputation has only grown.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Largely, this reputation revolves around his favored style of working. Being an actor known for disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, he had the director address him as “Mr. President” for the entire production – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he really send messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed for The Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we lost interest with over-the-top performances?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger at how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear all kinds of people 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 a major publication. “Everyone often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or an experience that causes extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the life of an actor, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry of Imitators
Frankly, this sounds as if the actor has come out from his retreat only to discover shocked by the world that has developed in his image. If you’re widely considered among the best performers in history, and your process includes striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in solitary confinement without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will attempt to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
Essentially, we exist in an environment populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to show the world the extensive degree of dedication they invest in a character. On the milder side of the pool we have people like 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 over 18 months as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” gifts to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded in creating a feature-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost Method Guy at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I recall him causing others to react with exasperation,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, aims to evoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis approaches his craft.
A Noble Yet Challenging Fight
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Maybe if he wishes to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just start making more films. Surely we could all get behind that.
