It’s been quite some time since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 declaring he would cease to work as an actor, just before the release of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend has only grown.
Largely, this legend centers on his preferred approach to roles. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in his characters – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, he had the director call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Is it true he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?
Madness in their method: have we lost interest with actorly excess?
Currently, Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger regarding how method acting is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems suggests that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he told the New York Times. “People often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and those details typically include some form of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. But of course, in the life for a performer, it must mainly focus on the internal work.”
To be honest, this sounds as if the actor has come out from his retreat and found himself aghast at the world that has developed in his image. If you’re widely considered one of the greatest actors to ever work, and your approach involves striking a prop until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or spending 48 hours in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will want to emulate that example by imitating your hero.
In other words, we exist in an environment full of half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of dedication they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend we have people like 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 became functionally Italian for a year and a half as preparation.
Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to fellow cast members. These items, according to various accounts, range from deceased animals to anal beads and used condoms, though Leto denied those worst excesses. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded to get a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties to the utmost for his colleagues.
The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it formed the basis of a derisive magazine feature, full of quotes from people who were worried about his conduct (“The toll on himself that worries me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I remember [him] making others roll their eyes,” said an unnamed co-star).
Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘never intended to retire, really’
We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler continues to talk like Elvis Presley, three years after that film came out. Each of these instances, to some extent, aims to evoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis approaches his work.
Moreover, while his fightback against method detractors could be commendable, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their practices. Perhaps if he wants to make audiences recall the true essence of the Method, or to show them its potential results, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply start making more films. Certainly everyone would support that idea.
Maya Chen is a freelance writer and urban enthusiast with a passion for documenting city life and cultural shifts.
