It’s been a long while since anyone caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. However, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Mythos of His Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his preferred approach to roles. Being an actor known for disappears into the roles he plays – for example, during the Lincoln biopic, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr. President” for the entire production – audiences has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he actually sent texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public lost interest with over-the-top performances?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his frustration regarding how method acting is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays to hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think is meant to imply that someone is acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he stated to the New York Times. “People often concentrate on the less important aspects of acting, and these elements typically include some sort of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or mental instability. But of course, in the life for a performer, it must mainly focus on the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
Frankly, this sounds like Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion only to discover aghast at the world that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re regarded as one of the greatest performers to ever work, and your approach involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will attempt to emulate that example by imitating their idol.
In other words, we exist in a landscape populated by imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they put into a character. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” gifts to fellow cast members. These, according to various accounts, range from dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they literally managed to get a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The main Method Guy currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the basis of a critical magazine feature, including statements from people who were either concerned for his behaviour (“It’s the cost to himself concerns me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I recall him causing others roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to stop acting, truly’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle might not be enough to alter perceptions, not to mention their practices. Perhaps if he wishes to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to demonstrate its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just start making more films. Surely we could all support that idea.
