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It has been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 declaring he would no longer pursue acting, prior to the release of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis withdrew from the spotlight. However, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.

The Legend of His Method

Primarily, this legend centers on his favored approach to roles. As someone who famously disappears into his characters – for instance, during Lincoln, he had the director address him as “Mr. President” throughout the shoot – audiences has grown more fascinated with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed during Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed while filming My Left Foot?

Extreme acting methods: has the public lost interest with actorly excess?

Currently, Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is using this to vocalise his anger regarding how method acting is viewed. “I am somewhat annoyed 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. “People often concentrate on superficial aspects of acting, and these elements always seem to involve some sort of self-flagellation or a situation that causes a severe discomfort or mental instability. However, in the career for a performer, it must mainly focus on the internal work.”

A World of Imitators

Frankly, this sounds like Day-Lewis has come out from his retreat and found himself shocked by the acting community that has been created in his image. When you are widely considered among the best actors in history, and your approach involves headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (for Gangs of New York) or spending two days in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.

In other words, we now live in a landscape full of imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to demonstrate the extensive degree of dedication they invest in a character. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award with House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she became functionally Italian over 18 months in preparation.

Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) through sending “horrifying” gifts to his castmates. These, according to various accounts, range from deceased animals to anal beads and personal hygiene products, although Leto denied the most extreme claims. And then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they literally managed in creating a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties to the utmost for everyone around him.

Contemporary Followers of the Method

The main Method Guy at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it became the subject of a critical magazine feature, including statements from individuals who were worried about his conduct (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I remember [him] making others roll their eyes,” stated an unnamed co-star).

Daniel Day-Lewis says he ‘did not plan to stop acting, really’

We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, three years after that film came out. All of this, to some extent, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.

A Noble Yet Challenging Fight

Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method could be commendable, a short publicity tour might not be enough to alter perceptions, let alone their practices. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to just start making more films. Certainly we could all support that idea.