It’s been quite some time since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would cease to work as an actor, just before the release of Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his reputation expanded further.
The Mythos of His Method
Primarily, this reputation centers on his preferred approach to roles. Being an actor known for immerses himself in the roles he plays – for instance, while filming Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr. President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he really send texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to express his frustration at how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear various individuals gobbling off and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems suggests that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on the less important aspects of acting, and those details always seem to involve some form of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”
A World of Imitators
Frankly, this sounds like Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion and found himself shocked by the world that has been created in his image. If you’re widely considered among the best performers to ever work, and your process involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will attempt to emulate that example by imitating their idol.
In other words, we exist in a landscape full of half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they put into their roles. At the shallow end of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign 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 as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, range from dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although Leto denied the most extreme claims. And then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they literally managed to get 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 at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose approach while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the subject of a derisive magazine feature, full of quotes from individuals who were either concerned for his behaviour (“The toll on himself that worries me,” remarked Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I remember him causing others roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘did not plan to stop acting, truly’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
A Noble Yet Challenging Fight
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their practices. Perhaps if he wishes to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing more films. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
