It’s been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would cease to work as an actor, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend expanded further.
The Legend of His Method
Primarily, this reputation revolves around his favored style of working. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in the roles he plays – for example, during Lincoln, he had the director call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – the world has become increasingly obsessed with his process. Did he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted for Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?
Currently, Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, 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 talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he told the New York Times. “People tends to focus on the less important aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or psychological strain. However, in the life for a performer, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds like the actor has come out from his retreat and found himself shocked by the world that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are widely considered one of the greatest performers to ever work, and your approach involves striking a prop to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or spending two days in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will want to emulate that example by imitating your hero.
Essentially, we exist in a landscape populated by imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to demonstrate the extensive degree of dedication they put into their roles. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she transformed into functionally Italian over 18 months as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These items, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although Leto denied those worst excesses. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded to get a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life to the utmost for his colleagues.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The main practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the basis of a critical New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“The toll to himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I remember him causing everyone else roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, really’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, years following the movie’s release. All of this, to some extent, is meant to invoke the dedication with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their practices. Maybe if he wants to remind people what method acting is, or to show them its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing additional movies. Surely everyone would get behind that.
