It has been quite some time since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 declaring he would cease to pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Largely, this legend centers on his favored approach to roles. As someone known for immerses himself in his characters – for instance, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he actually sent texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he consumed solely game he hunted for The Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on being spoon-fed for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we lost interest with over-the-top performances?
Currently, Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. He is taking this chance to express his frustration at how method acting is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear all kinds of people gobbling off and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems is meant to imply that someone is acting insane in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “People often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and those details typically include some sort of self-flagellation or an experience that causes extreme unease or mental instability. But of course, in the career of an actor, it has to principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry of Imitators
To be honest, this sounds like Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has developed in his image. When you are regarded as one of the greatest performers to ever work, and your approach includes headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will attempt to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we now live in an environment populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of dedication they put into their roles. At the shallow end of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself in the character of the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, though 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 succeeded in creating a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
The Modern Method Practitioners
The main practitioner of the Method currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the subject of a critical New Yorker profile, full of quotes from people who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall him causing everyone else to react with exasperation,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to retire, truly’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during 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, aims to evoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.
A Noble But Uphill Battle
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle 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 show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply begin producing more films. Surely everyone would get behind that.
