It’s been quite some time since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, the actor withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.
The Mythos of His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his favored style of working. As someone known for disappears into the roles he plays – for example, during Lincoln, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – the world has become increasingly obsessed with his process. Is it true he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed for Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: have we lost interest with actorly excess?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger at how the Method technique is viewed. “I’m a little cross nowadays when I hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he stated to the New York Times. “Everyone tends to focus on superficial details of the work, and those details typically include some form of self-flagellation or a situation that causes extreme unease or mental instability. But of course, in the life of an actor, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
Frankly, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as among the best performers in history, and your process includes striking a prop until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to fill that vacuum by imitating their idol.
Essentially, we exist in an environment full of imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they invest in their roles. On the milder side of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she transformed into an Italian native for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself in the character of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “disturbing” gifts to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although Leto denied those worst excesses. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed to get a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
The Modern Followers of the Method
The foremost Method Guy currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a critical magazine feature, including statements from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall him causing others to react with exasperation,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims 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. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, three years after that film came out. All of this, to some extent, aims to evoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight
Moreover, although his rebuttal against method detractors could be commendable, a short publicity tour might not be enough to alter perceptions, let alone their practices. Maybe if he wishes to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to show them what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to just begin producing additional movies. Certainly we could all support that idea.
