It’s been a long while since anyone caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would cease to pursue acting, prior to the release of Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. However, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.
The Mythos of His Method
Largely, this reputation centers on his preferred approach to roles. Being an actor known for immerses himself in the roles he plays – for instance, during Lincoln, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become more fascinated with how he works. Is it true he actually sent texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted for Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger regarding how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems is meant to imply that someone is acting insane in a drastic way,” he stated to a major publication. “People often concentrate on superficial aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the life for a performer, it has to mainly focus on the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds like the actor has come out from his retreat only to discover shocked by the world that has developed mirroring his methods. If you’re widely considered one of the greatest performers to ever work, and your approach includes striking a prop until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in solitary confinement without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we now live in a landscape full of half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who strive only to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they put into a character. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion trying to convince everyone that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These items, according to various accounts, included deceased animals to anal beads and used condoms, though Leto denied the most extreme claims. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed in creating a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life to the utmost for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The main practitioner of the Method currently seems 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 magazine feature, full of quotes from people who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I recall him causing everyone else to react with exasperation,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘never intended 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 Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after the movie’s release. Each of these instances, to some extent, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
A Noble But Uphill Fight
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wants to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to just start making more films. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
