It’s been quite some time since the public caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would cease to pursue acting, just before the release of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. However, during his hiatus, his legend has only grown.
The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method
Largely, this reputation centers on his preferred approach to roles. As someone who famously disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: have we fallen out of love 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 vocalise his frustration regarding how method acting is viewed. “I’m a little cross these days when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which I think suggests that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he told a major publication. “Everyone often concentrate on superficial aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-flagellation or an experience that causes extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the life for a performer, it has to principally be about the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are widely considered one of the greatest actors in history, and your process includes striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will want to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.
In other words, we exist in a landscape populated by half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who strive only to demonstrate the extensive degree of effort they put into a character. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” gifts to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, range from deceased animals to intimate objects and used condoms, though the actor refuted the most extreme claims. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they succeeded to get a feature-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The main Method Guy at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose approach while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a critical magazine feature, full of quotes from people who were either concerned about his conduct (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I remember him causing others roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, really’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, years following the movie’s release. All of this, to some extent, aims to evoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour might not be enough to alter perceptions, not to mention their practices. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing additional movies. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
