It has been a long while since anyone saw or heard from 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, during his hiatus, his reputation has only grown.
The Mythos of His Method
Primarily, this reputation centers on his favored style of working. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in his characters – for example, while filming Lincoln, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr President” for the entire production – the world has become increasingly obsessed with his process. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Extreme acting methods: has the public fallen out of love with actorly excess?
Currently, Day-Lewis has returned in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his frustration at how method acting is viewed. “I’m a little cross nowadays when I hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems suggests that someone is behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he told the New York Times. “People tends to focus on the less important details of the work, and these elements typically include some sort of self-flagellation or an experience that causes a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the life for a performer, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”
An Industry of Imitators
Frankly, this sounds like Day-Lewis has emerged from his retreat and found himself aghast at the world that has been created mirroring his methods. If you’re regarded as one of the greatest performers in history, and your process involves striking a prop until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or spending two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating their idol.
In other words, 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 dedication they put into a character. At the shallow end of the pool there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself into the role of the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, range from dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, though Leto denied those worst excesses. Then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they succeeded in creating a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life as impossible as he could for his colleagues.
Contemporary Method Practitioners
The main practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose approach during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the subject of a critical magazine feature, including statements from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“The toll on himself concerns me,” said co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by it (“I recall [him] making others roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).
The actor claims he ‘did not plan to retire, truly’
We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after that film came out. All of this, in part, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his work.
An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight
And, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to simply start making more films. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
