It’s been a long while since anyone saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, the actor withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his preferred style of working. As someone who famously disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during Lincoln, he had the director call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – the world has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he only eat game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? 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, Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. He is taking this chance to vocalise his anger regarding how the Method technique is viewed. “I’m a little cross nowadays when I hear all kinds of people gobbling off and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he stated to a major publication. “People often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the life for a performer, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, this sounds like the actor has come out from seclusion only to discover aghast at the acting community that has been created in his image. If you’re widely considered one of the greatest actors to ever work, and your process includes headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic their idol.
In other words, we now live in a landscape populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to demonstrate the extensive degree of dedication they invest in a character. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she transformed into functionally Italian over 18 months as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself into the role of the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to fellow cast members. These items, according to various accounts, range from dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although Leto denied the most extreme claims. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they succeeded in creating a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
The Modern Followers of the Method
The main practitioner of the Method currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, including statements from people who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” remarked Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I remember him causing others to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor claims he ‘never intended to retire, truly’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. All of this, to some extent, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his craft.
An Admirable But Uphill Battle
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle might not be enough to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their practices. Maybe if he wishes to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to show them what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to just start making additional movies. Certainly we could all get behind that.
