It’s been quite some time since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 that he would no longer work as an actor, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. However, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Legend of His Method
Largely, this reputation centers on his favored approach to roles. As someone who famously disappears into his characters – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become more fascinated with his process. Did he actually sent texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed for Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger at how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems is meant to imply that someone is behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he told a major publication. “Everyone tends to focus on superficial aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or psychological strain. But of course, in the career of an actor, it must principally be about the internal work.”
A World Full of Followers
Frankly, it appears as if the actor has come out from his retreat and found himself shocked by the world that has been created mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach involves headbutting a dummy 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), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by imitating your hero.
In other words, we now live in an environment populated by imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they put into a character. At the shallow end of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she became an Italian native over 18 months in preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These items, according to various accounts, included deceased animals to anal beads and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. Then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed to get a feature-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 rigorously detailed that it formed the basis of a critical New Yorker profile, including statements from people who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I recall [him] making others to react with exasperation,” said an unnamed co-star).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘did not plan to retire, really’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, three years after that film came out. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their practices. Maybe if he wants to remind people what method acting is, or to show them what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply start making additional movies. Surely everyone would get behind that.
