🔗 Share this article Daniel Day-Lewis Voices Annoyance Over Method Acting Being Equated to ‘Acting Insanely’ – Which Is Precisely the Reason We Love It It’s been a long while since anyone caught a glimpse of the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would cease to pursue acting, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, the actor quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend has only grown. The Mythos of His Acting Method Largely, this legend centers on his favored style of working. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in his characters – for example, while filming Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he actually sent texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Did he only eat game he hunted for The Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on being spoon-fed for My Left Foot? Madness in their method: have we lost interest with over-the-top performances? Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. He is taking this chance to express his anger at how method acting is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear all kinds of people talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems suggests that someone is behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he stated to the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and these elements typically include some sort of self-flagellation or a situation that causes extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it must principally be about the inner transformation.” An Industry of Imitators Frankly, it appears like the actor has come out from seclusion only to discover aghast at the acting community that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as one of the greatest actors to ever work, and your process includes striking a prop to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that other actors will want to emulate that example by imitating their idol. Fully immersed in Italian culture … Lady Gaga in House of Gucci. In other words, we now live in an environment populated by half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of effort they invest in their roles. On the milder side 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 attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian over 18 months in preparation. Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to deeply embed himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to his castmates. These, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep into Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they succeeded in creating a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for his colleagues. The Modern Method Practitioners The main practitioner of the Method at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose approach during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a critical magazine feature, full of quotes from people who were worried about his conduct (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” remarked Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I remember him causing everyone else roll their eyes,” stated an anonymous cast member). The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, really’ There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. All of this, to some extent, aims to evoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work. An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight Moreover, while his fightback to critics of the Method could be commendable, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, let alone their practices. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just begin producing additional movies. Certainly everyone would support that idea.