It has been a long while since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 that he would cease to work as an actor, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his reputation expanded further.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his favored style of working. Being an actor known for disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director address him as “Mr President” for the entire production – audiences has grown more fascinated with his process. Did he really send messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Did he consumed solely animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: has the public fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger at how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays to hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems is meant to imply that someone is acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he stated to a major publication. “People tends to focus on the less important details of the work, and those details typically include some form of self-punishment or an experience that causes a severe discomfort or mental instability. But of course, in the career of an actor, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, it appears as if the actor has emerged from his retreat and found himself aghast at the acting community that has developed mirroring his methods. If you’re widely considered one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach involves striking a prop to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or spending two days in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic their idol.
Essentially, we now live in an environment full of imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who strive only to show the world the extensive degree of effort they put into their roles. On the milder side of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian over 18 months as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” gifts to his castmates. These items, depending on who you ask, range from dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, 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 literally managed to get a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the basis of a derisive New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I remember him causing everyone else roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘never intended to retire, really’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, years following the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.
A Noble But Uphill Battle
And, although his rebuttal against method detractors could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their behaviour. Perhaps if he wants 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 additional movies. Surely we could all support that idea.
