It’s been a long while since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 declaring he would cease to work as an actor, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, in his absence, his legend has only grown.
The Legend of His Method
Largely, this legend revolves around his favored approach to roles. As someone known for disappears into his characters – for instance, during the Lincoln biopic, he had the director call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – audiences has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he really send messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely game he hunted during Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?
Now, Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his frustration at how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays to hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which seems is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he stated to a major publication. “People often concentrate on the less important aspects of acting, and those details always seem to involve some sort of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it must mainly focus on the inner transformation.”
An Industry Full of Followers
Frankly, it appears as if the actor has come out from his retreat and found himself aghast at the world that has developed in his image. When you are regarded as one of the greatest actors in history, and your process includes headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or spending two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.
Essentially, we exist in an environment populated by imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of dedication they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was determined to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she spent the entire promotion trying to convince everyone that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to fellow cast members. These, depending on who you ask, range from dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although Leto denied the most extreme claims. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded in creating a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties to the utmost for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The foremost practitioner of the Method currently would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose approach while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the basis of a derisive magazine feature, including statements from people who were either concerned about his conduct (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall him causing everyone else to react with exasperation,” stated an unnamed co-star).
The actor claims he ‘never intended to retire, truly’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.
A Noble Yet Challenging Battle
Moreover, although his rebuttal against method detractors might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their behaviour. Maybe if he wishes to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing more films. Surely everyone would support that idea.
