It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his reputation expanded further.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this reputation centers on his preferred approach to roles. 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” throughout the shoot – the world has become increasingly obsessed with his process. Is it true he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he only eat game he hunted for Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: have we lost interest with actorly excess?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger at how the Method technique is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays when I hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and saying things 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 the less important aspects of acting, and those details always seem to involve some sort of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the career for a performer, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, this sounds like Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has been created in his image. If you’re regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach includes striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in solitary confinement without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will attempt to emulate that example 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 sheer amount of effort they put into a character. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she transformed into an Italian native over 18 months as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, range from deceased animals to anal beads and used condoms, although the actor refuted the most extreme claims. And then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they succeeded to get a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
The Modern Followers of the Method
The main practitioner of the Method currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose approach while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the basis of a critical New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“The toll on himself concerns me,” remarked Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I recall him causing others roll their eyes,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, really’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, three years after that film came out. All of this, to some extent, is meant to invoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his work.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their behaviour. Maybe if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply begin producing more films. Certainly we could all get behind that.
