It’s been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 declaring he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his legend expanded further.
The Legend Surrounding His Method
Largely, this legend centers on his preferred style of working. Being an actor known for disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” for the entire production – the world has become more fascinated with his process. Did he actually sent texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Did he consumed solely animals he’d killed during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?
Now, Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to vocalise his frustration at how the Method technique is viewed. “I’m a little cross these days to hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems suggests that someone is behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he stated to the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and those details always seem to involve some form of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the career for a performer, it has to principally be about the inner transformation.”
A World Full of Followers
To be honest, it appears like Day-Lewis has come out from his retreat and found himself aghast at the acting community that has developed in his image. If you’re widely considered among the best actors to ever work, 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 (for 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 full of half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign trying to convince everyone 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 as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to his castmates. These, according to various accounts, range from dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, though the actor refuted the most extreme claims. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded to get a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life as impossible as he could for everyone around him.
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 laboriously intensive that it formed the subject of a critical magazine feature, full of quotes from people who were either concerned for his behaviour (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I recall [him] making others to react with exasperation,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor says he ‘did not plan to retire, truly’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. Each of these instances, to some extent, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight
And, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their behaviour. Maybe if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, 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 support that idea.
