It’s been a long while since anyone caught a glimpse of Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the debut of The Phantom Thread, the actor withdrew from the spotlight. However, in his absence, his legend expanded further.
The Mythos Surrounding His Acting Method
Largely, this legend revolves around his preferred approach to roles. As someone who famously disappears into the roles he plays – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. 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? And did he insist on being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Currently, Day-Lewis is back to public attention, with some hesitation, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to express his anger 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 ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems is meant to imply that a person’s acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he told the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on superficial aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or an experience that causes extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the life of an actor, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry Full of Followers
To be honest, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from seclusion and found himself aghast at the acting community that has been created mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as among the best performers in history, and your process includes headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or spending two days in isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by trying to mimic their idol.
Essentially, we now live in an environment populated by imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to show the world 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 for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half as preparation.
Then we have Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to his castmates. These items, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, though Leto denied those worst excesses. 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 feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life to the utmost for everyone around him.
Contemporary Followers of the Method
The foremost Method Guy at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the subject of a critical New Yorker profile, full of quotes from individuals who were worried about his conduct (“The toll on himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I recall [him] making everyone else roll their eyes,” said an unnamed co-star).
The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, really’
There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, years following that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
An Admirable But Uphill Fight
And, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to remind people what method acting is, or to show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making more films. Certainly we could all support that idea.
