It’s been quite some time since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend has only grown.
The Mythos of His Acting Method
Largely, this reputation centers on his favored style of working. Being an actor who famously disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – the world has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he actually sent texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed for Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?
Currently, Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger at how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed these days when I hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems is meant to imply that someone is behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he stated to a major publication. “People tends to focus on superficial details of the work, and these elements typically include some sort of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it has to principally be about the internal work.”
A World of Imitators
Frankly, this sounds as if the actor has come out from his retreat and found himself shocked by the world that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach includes striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by imitating their idol.
Essentially, we exist in an environment full of imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they put into a character. At the shallow end of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion trying to convince everyone that she became an Italian native over 18 months in preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” presents to his castmates. These, according to various accounts, included deceased animals to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully 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 to the utmost for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost practitioner of the Method currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the basis of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from people who were either concerned about his conduct (“The toll on himself concerns me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I remember [him] making everyone else roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘never intended to retire, really’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler continues to talk 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
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their practices. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just begin producing more films. Certainly we could all get behind that.
