It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 that he would cease to pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this reputation centers on his favored approach to roles. As someone known for immerses himself in his characters – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has grown 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 consumed solely game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?
Now, Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, with some hesitation, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger regarding how the Method technique is viewed. “I’m a little cross these days 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 an extreme fashion,” he told a major publication. “People often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and those details always seem to involve some sort of self-flagellation or a situation that causes extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry of Imitators
Frankly, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from his retreat only to discover aghast at the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. When you are widely considered among the best performers to ever work, and your approach involves headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (for Gangs of New York) or spending two days in isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we exist in an environment populated by imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they invest in their roles. On the milder side of the pool there are performers such as 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 became an Italian native for a year and a half in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself in the character of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although the actor refuted the most extreme claims. Then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they succeeded in creating a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life to the utmost for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the basis of a derisive New Yorker profile, including statements from people who were worried about his conduct (“It’s the cost to himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall [him] making others roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
Daniel Day-Lewis claims he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, years following that film came out. All of this, in part, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
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, not to mention their behaviour. Maybe if he wants to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to just begin producing additional movies. Surely we could all support that idea.
