It’s been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 declaring he would cease to work as an actor, prior to the release of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Legend of His Acting Method
Primarily, this legend centers on his preferred style of working. Being an actor known for immerses himself in the roles he plays – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” for the entire production – audiences has become more fascinated with how he works. Is it true he really send messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he consumed solely game he hunted for The Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?
Currently, Day-Lewis is back to public attention, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger at how the Method technique is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear various individuals gobbling off and using phrases like ‘gone full method’, which I think is meant to imply that someone is acting insane in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on the less important aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or mental instability. But of course, in the life of an actor, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”
A World of Imitators
Frankly, it appears as if the actor has emerged from seclusion only to discover aghast at the acting community that has developed mirroring his methods. If you’re widely considered among the best actors in history, and your approach includes headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to fill that vacuum by imitating their idol.
In other words, we now live in a landscape full of imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became an Italian native over 18 months in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These items, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed to get a feature-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
The Modern 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 rigorously detailed that it formed the subject of a critical New Yorker profile, full of quotes 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 remember [him] making others roll their eyes,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor claims he ‘never intended to retire, truly’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, years following the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour might not be enough to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wants to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing additional movies. Certainly we could all get behind that.
