It has been a long while since the public caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 that he would cease to pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his reputation expanded further.
The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method
Largely, this reputation centers on his favored style of working. Being an actor known for disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – the world has grown more fascinated with how he works. Did he actually sent texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted for Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on being spoon-fed for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?
Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. He is taking this chance to vocalise his anger at how the Method technique is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear various individuals gobbling off and using phrases like ‘gone full method’, which I think is meant to imply that a person’s acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he stated to the New York Times. “People tends to focus on the less important details of the work, and those details always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or an experience that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or psychological strain. However, in the life for a performer, it must principally be about the internal work.”
A World of Imitators
To be honest, this sounds as if the actor has come out from his retreat and found himself aghast at the acting community that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as among the best performers in history, and your approach involves striking a prop to the point of injury (for Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
Essentially, we now live in an environment populated by imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of dedication they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, though Leto denied those worst excesses. Then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded in creating 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 (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the basis of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from people who were worried for his behaviour (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I recall him causing others roll their eyes,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor claims he ‘never intended to stop acting, truly’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, years following the movie’s release. All of this, in part, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, although his rebuttal against method detractors might be noble, a short publicity tour might not be enough to change anyone’s mind, let alone their behaviour. Maybe if he wishes to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to show them what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just begin producing additional movies. Certainly we could all get behind that.
