🔗 Share this article

It has been quite some time since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer work as an actor, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.

The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method

Primarily, this legend revolves around his favored approach to roles. Being an actor known for immerses himself in the roles he plays – for example, while filming Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” for the entire production – audiences has grown more fascinated with his process. Did he really send messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat animals he’d killed during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?

Madness in their method: has the public lost interest with over-the-top performances?

Now, Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger regarding how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear various individuals gobbling off and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think is meant to imply that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he told a major publication. “People tends to focus on the less important aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or psychological strain. However, in the career of an actor, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”

An Industry of Imitators

To be honest, it appears as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion only to discover shocked by the world that has developed in his image. When you are regarded as among the best performers to ever work, and your approach includes striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating their idol.

Essentially, we now live in a landscape populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to demonstrate the extensive degree of dedication they put into a character. On the milder side of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.

Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself in the character of the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they succeeded in creating a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties to the utmost for everyone around him.

The Modern Method Practitioners

The foremost Method Guy at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the subject of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“It’s the cost to himself concerns me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I recall him causing everyone else roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).

The actor says he ‘never intended to retire, truly’

We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, years following that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.

An Admirable But Uphill Fight

Moreover, although his rebuttal against method detractors might be noble, a brief promotional cycle might not be enough to alter perceptions, not to mention their practices. Perhaps if he wishes to remind people what method acting is, or to show them what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to just start making additional movies. Certainly everyone would get behind that.