It’s been a long while since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, the actor withdrew from the spotlight. However, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his favored approach to roles. Being an actor known for immerses himself in his characters – for instance, while filming Lincoln, he had the director call him “Mr. President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become more fascinated with his process. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat animals he’d killed for Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: has the public fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Now, Day-Lewis is back to public attention, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger regarding how method acting is perceived. “I’m a little cross these days to hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems suggests that someone is behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he told the New York Times. “People often concentrate on superficial aspects of acting, and those details typically include some form of self-punishment or a situation that causes extreme unease or psychological strain. But of course, in the life of an actor, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”
A World of Imitators
To be honest, it appears like the actor has come out from seclusion and found himself aghast at the world that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are widely considered one of the greatest actors in history, and your process involves headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (for Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we exist in an environment populated by half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the sheer amount of effort they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she transformed into an Italian native for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, though Leto denied those worst excesses. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they literally managed in creating a feature-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The main Method Guy currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the subject of a critical magazine feature, including statements from individuals who were worried about his conduct (“The toll to himself that worries me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I recall him causing everyone else roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).
Daniel Day-Lewis claims he ‘never intended to stop acting, really’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis approaches his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle might not be enough to alter perceptions, not to mention their practices. Perhaps if he wants 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 simply start making additional movies. Surely we could all get behind that.
