It has been quite some time since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his legend expanded further.
The Legend of His Acting Method
Primarily, this reputation revolves around his preferred approach to roles. As someone known for immerses himself in the roles he plays – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has grown more fascinated with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. He is using this to vocalise his anger at how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays to hear various individuals talking carelessly and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think suggests that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he told a major publication. “People often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or a situation that causes extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the life for a performer, it must mainly focus on the internal work.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, it appears as if the actor has come out from seclusion only to discover aghast at the acting community that has developed in his image. If you’re widely considered one of the greatest actors to ever work, and your process involves headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.
In other words, we exist in an environment full of imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of dedication they invest in a character. At the shallow end of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she transformed into functionally Italian over 18 months in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These, depending on who you ask, included deceased animals to anal beads and used condoms, though the actor refuted those worst excesses. Then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded to get a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties to the utmost for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear 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, including statements from people who were either concerned for his behaviour (“It’s the cost to himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I remember [him] making everyone else to react with exasperation,” said an anonymous cast member).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘did not plan to stop acting, truly’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after that film came out. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.
An Admirable But Uphill Battle
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their practices. Perhaps if he wishes to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to demonstrate its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply begin producing additional movies. Certainly everyone would get behind that.
