It has been quite some time since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 declaring he would no longer work as an actor, prior to the release of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend has only grown.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Largely, this legend revolves around his preferred approach to roles. As someone who famously immerses himself in the roles he plays – for instance, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” for the entire production – audiences has grown more fascinated with his process. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he consumed solely game he hunted for The Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: have we lost interest with actorly excess?
Now, Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger at how method acting is viewed. “I’m a little cross these days to hear all kinds of people gobbling off and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems suggests that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “People tends to focus on the less important details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the career for a performer, it must principally be about the internal work.”
An Industry Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion and found himself aghast at the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re widely considered among the best performers in history, and your approach involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
Essentially, we exist in a landscape populated by imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who strive only to demonstrate 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 whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became functionally Italian over 18 months in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “disturbing” presents to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed in creating a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
The Modern Followers of the Method
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the subject of a derisive magazine feature, including statements from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“The toll to himself concerns me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall [him] making others roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to retire, truly’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, years following that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
A Noble But Uphill Battle
And, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to remind people what method acting is, or to show them what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making additional movies. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
