It has been a long while since the public caught a glimpse of the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 declaring he would cease to pursue acting, just before the release of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, in his absence, his legend expanded further.
The Legend of His Method
Primarily, this legend centers on his favored style of working. As someone who famously immerses himself in his characters – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, he had the director call him “Mr. President” throughout the shoot – the world has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he really send messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: have we fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to express his anger regarding how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days when I hear various individuals gobbling off and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think suggests that someone is acting insane in a drastic way,” he stated to the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and those details typically include some sort of self-punishment or a situation that causes extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it must mainly focus on the internal work.”
An Industry Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds like the actor has emerged from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has developed in his image. If you’re regarded as among the best actors to ever work, and your approach includes headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we now live in an environment full of imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of dedication they invest in a character. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, although the actor refuted the most extreme claims. And then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded to get a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The main practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the basis of a critical New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were either concerned for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” remarked Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I recall [him] making everyone else 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 slept in 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, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his craft.
A Noble Yet Challenging Battle
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a short publicity tour might not be enough to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their practices. Maybe if he wants to remind people what method acting is, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing additional movies. Certainly we could all support that idea.
