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It’s been a long while since anyone saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his announcement in 2017 declaring he would no longer work as an actor, prior to the debut of Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his reputation expanded further.

The Legend of His Method

Primarily, this legend centers on his preferred approach to roles. Being an actor known for disappears into his characters – for instance, during Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” for the entire production – the world has become more fascinated with how he works. Is it true he really send messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Was it accurate that he only eat game he hunted during Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?

Madness in their method: has the public fallen out of love with actorly excess?

Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. And he is taking this chance to vocalise his frustration regarding how the Method technique is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear all kinds of people gobbling off and saying things like ‘gone full method’, which I think is meant to imply that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in an extreme fashion,” he stated to a major publication. “People tends to focus on the less important aspects of acting, and those details typically include some sort of self-punishment or a situation that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the life for a performer, it has to mainly focus on the internal work.”

An Industry Full of Followers

Frankly, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has come out from his retreat only to discover shocked by the acting community that has developed in his image. When you are widely considered one of the greatest performers in history, and your process involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation deprived of sustenance (for In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will attempt to emulate that example by trying to mimic your hero.

In other words, we exist in an environment populated by imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they put into their roles. On the milder side of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she transformed into an Italian native for a year and a half in preparation.

Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” presents to fellow cast members. These, according to various accounts, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, although the actor refuted the most extreme claims. And then, naturally, there is Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that they succeeded to get a full-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him making life to the utmost for his colleagues.

Contemporary Followers of the Method

The foremost practitioner of the Method at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (once Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the basis of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“The toll on himself that worries me,” remarked co-star Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I remember him causing others to react with exasperation,” stated an unnamed co-star).

Daniel Day-Lewis claims he ‘never intended to retire, truly’

There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield went celibate over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, years following the movie’s release. Each of these instances, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis approaches his craft.

A Noble Yet Challenging Battle

Moreover, while his fightback against method detractors might be noble, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, let alone their behaviour. Perhaps if he wants to remind people the true essence of the Method, or to show them what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing more films. Surely we could all support that idea.