It has been quite some time since the public caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Legend Surrounding His Acting Method
Primarily, this reputation revolves around his favored style of working. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in his characters – for instance, during Lincoln, he had the director address him as “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has grown more fascinated with his process. Is it true he really send messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he only eat animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: 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. He is using this to express his frustration regarding how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which I think suggests that someone is acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he stated to the New York Times. “Everyone tends to focus on the less important details of the work, 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 career for a performer, it must principally be about the internal work.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds as if the actor has emerged from seclusion and found himself shocked by the acting community that has been created in his image. If you’re regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach involves headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic your hero.
Essentially, we exist in a landscape full of half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they invest in a character. On the milder side of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion trying to convince everyone that she became functionally Italian over 18 months as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself in the character of the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “disturbing” presents to fellow cast members. These, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. Then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman during 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 his colleagues.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were worried about his conduct (“The toll to himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I remember [him] making everyone else roll their eyes,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight
And, while his fightback against method detractors might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing more films. Surely everyone would get behind that.
