It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer work as an actor, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Mythos of His Method
Largely, this reputation revolves around his favored approach to roles. As someone known for disappears into his characters – for example, during Lincoln, he had the director call him “Mr President” for the entire production – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with his process. Is it true he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he only eat game he hunted for The Last of the Mohicans? 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, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to vocalise his frustration regarding how method acting is perceived. “I’m a little cross these days to hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and using phrases like ‘gone full method’, which seems suggests that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he told a major publication. “People often concentrate on superficial details of the work, and those details typically include some form of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or psychological strain. But of course, in the career for a performer, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry of Imitators
To be honest, this sounds like Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion only to discover shocked by the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re regarded as among the best performers in history, and your process involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring 48 hours in isolation deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating their idol.
In other words, we now live in an environment full of imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to show the world the extensive degree of effort 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 dedicated 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 (in Suicide Squad) by sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, though the actor refuted the most extreme claims. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman for 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.
The Modern Followers of the Method
The main Method Guy at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a derisive magazine feature, full of quotes from individuals who were either concerned for his behaviour (“The toll on himself that worries me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I remember [him] making everyone else roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor says he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’
There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, aims to evoke the dedication with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable But Uphill Fight
And, although his rebuttal against method detractors might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, not to mention their behaviour. Maybe if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply start making more films. Certainly everyone would get behind that.
