It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 that he would cease to pursue acting, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, during his hiatus, his legend expanded further.
The Mythos of His Method
Primarily, this legend revolves around his preferred approach to roles. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in his characters – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with his process. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Did he consumed solely animals he’d killed for The Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: has the public lost interest with over-the-top performances?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, with some hesitation, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to express his frustration at how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and using phrases like ‘gone full method’, which seems suggests 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 those details typically include some form of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. But of course, in the life of an actor, it has to principally be about the internal work.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds like Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion and found himself shocked by the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re widely considered among the best actors to ever work, and your process involves headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or spending two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will attempt to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we now live in a landscape populated by imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to demonstrate the extensive degree of effort they invest in their roles. On the milder side of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she dedicated 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) through sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, range from deceased animals to anal beads and personal hygiene products, although the actor refuted the most extreme claims. And then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they literally managed in creating a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost practitioner of the Method currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the basis of a critical magazine feature, including statements from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“It’s the cost on himself concerns me,” remarked Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I remember him causing others to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor says he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, years following the movie’s release. All of this, to some extent, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
A Noble But Uphill Battle
And, while his fightback against method detractors might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, not to mention their practices. Perhaps if he wants to remind people what method acting is, or to show them what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just start making additional movies. Certainly everyone would get behind that.
