It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 that he would no longer pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend expanded further.
The Mythos of His Method
Largely, this legend revolves around his preferred style of working. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in the roles he plays – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr President” for the entire production – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely game he hunted during The 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 actorly excess?
Currently, Day-Lewis is back to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. And he is taking this chance to vocalise his frustration regarding how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think suggests that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he told a major publication. “People tends to focus on superficial details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-flagellation or a situation that causes a severe discomfort or mental instability. But of course, in the career for a performer, it must mainly focus on the internal work.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds as if the actor has come out from seclusion only to discover shocked by the world that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re 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 isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will want to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.
In other words, we now live in a landscape full of imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who strive only to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they put into their roles. At the shallow end of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became an Italian native for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, though the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they succeeded to get a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The main practitioner of the Method currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a derisive magazine feature, including statements from people who were worried about his conduct (“The toll on himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I remember [him] making others to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).
The actor says he ‘did not plan to retire, truly’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, years following the movie’s release. All of this, in part, aims to evoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable But Uphill Fight
Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply start making more films. Surely we could all support that idea.
