It has been quite some time since the public caught a glimpse of the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer pursue acting, just before the release of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, in his absence, his legend has only grown.
The Mythos of His Acting Method
Largely, this reputation centers on his preferred style of working. Being an actor known for disappears into the roles he plays – for example, during Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr. President” throughout the shoot – audiences has grown more fascinated with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat animals he’d killed during The Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we lost interest with over-the-top performances?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger regarding how method acting is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays when I hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems is meant to imply that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he stated to a major publication. “People often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and these elements typically include some form of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the life for a performer, it has to principally be about the internal work.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, this sounds like the actor has emerged from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has developed in his image. When you are regarded as among the best actors to ever work, and your approach involves 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), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to emulate that example by imitating your hero.
Essentially, we now live in an environment populated by half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who strive only to demonstrate the sheer amount of dedication they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became an Italian native over 18 months in preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, included deceased animals to intimate objects and used condoms, though the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed to get a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a critical magazine feature, full of quotes from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself concerns me,” remarked Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I remember [him] making everyone else to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, truly’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in an animal carcass for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.
A Noble But Uphill Fight
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle might not be enough to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their practices. Maybe if he wishes to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making additional movies. Certainly everyone would get behind that.
