It has been a long while since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 declaring he would cease to work as an actor, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, in his absence, his reputation has only grown.
The Legend Surrounding His Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his favored approach to roles. As someone who famously disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr. President” for the entire production – audiences has become increasingly obsessed with his process. Is it true he actually sent texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted during Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger at how method acting is perceived. “I’m a little cross these days when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he told a major publication. “People often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and those details always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or psychological strain. However, in the career of an actor, it must mainly focus on the inner transformation.”
An Industry Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds as if the actor has emerged from his retreat and found himself aghast at the world that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are widely considered one of the greatest actors in history, and your process involves striking a prop to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in solitary confinement without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by imitating their idol.
In other words, we exist in a landscape populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world the sheer amount of effort they invest in a character. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became functionally Italian over 18 months as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself in the character of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, included deceased animals to intimate objects and used condoms, although Leto denied the most extreme claims. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they literally managed to get a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties to the utmost for everyone around him.
The Modern Method Practitioners
The main Method Guy currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“The toll to himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I remember him causing everyone else to react with exasperation,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to stop acting, truly’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler continues to talk 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 approaches his work.
A Noble Yet Challenging Fight
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour might not be enough to alter perceptions, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making more films. Certainly we could all get behind that.
