It has been quite some time since the public caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 declaring he would cease to pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend expanded further.
The Legend of His Method
Largely, this legend revolves around his favored style of working. Being an actor known for immerses himself in his characters – for instance, while filming Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has grown more fascinated with how he works. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he consumed solely animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to express his frustration at how the Method technique is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which I think suggests that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he stated to a major publication. “People tends to focus on superficial aspects of acting, and those details typically include some form of self-flagellation or an experience that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the career of an actor, it must principally be about the internal work.”
An Industry Full of Followers
To be honest, it appears as if the actor has emerged from seclusion only to discover aghast at the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your process includes headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in solitary confinement deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.
In other words, we now live in an environment full of half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of effort they invest in a character. On the milder side of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she transformed into an Italian native for a year and a half as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to his castmates. These items, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, though the actor refuted the most extreme claims. Then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded in creating a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The main Method Guy at the moment would appear 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, including statements from people who were worried for his behaviour (“The toll on himself concerns me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I remember [him] making everyone else roll their eyes,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, truly’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, three years after the movie’s release. Each of these instances, to some extent, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.
An Admirable But Uphill Fight
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method 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 Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making more films. Certainly we could all get behind that.