It has been quite some time since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 that he would cease to work as an actor, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. However, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.
The Legend of His Method
Largely, this legend centers on his favored style of working. As someone known for disappears into his characters – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director address him as “Mr President” for the entire production – the world has grown more fascinated with his process. Did he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he consumed solely game he hunted for The Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. He is using this to express his anger at how the Method technique is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear various individuals gobbling off 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 a major publication. “Everyone tends to focus on superficial aspects of acting, and these elements typically include some sort of self-punishment or a situation that causes a severe discomfort or mental instability. But of course, in the life for a performer, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”
An Industry of Imitators
Frankly, it appears as if Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion and found himself aghast at the world that has developed in his image. When you are widely considered one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach involves headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in isolation without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will want to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.
In other words, we now live in a landscape populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of effort they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became an Italian native 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 dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, though Leto denied the most extreme claims. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they literally managed in creating a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The main practitioner of the Method currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the basis of a critical New Yorker profile, including statements from individuals who were worried about his conduct (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall him causing others roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in an animal carcass during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, years following the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, while his fightback against method detractors might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their practices. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply begin producing more films. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
