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It’s been a long while since anyone saw or heard from the acclaimed actor Daniel Day-Lewis. Following his statement in 2017 declaring he would no longer pursue acting, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, in his absence, his legend expanded further.

The Legend Surrounding His Acting 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 the director call him “Mr. President” for the entire production – audiences has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he actually sent texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely game he hunted during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he insist on being spoon-fed for My Left Foot?

Extreme acting methods: has the public fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?

Now, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. He is using this to express his frustration at how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays to hear all kinds of people gobbling off and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think is meant to imply that someone is acting insane in an extreme fashion,” he stated to the New York Times. “People often concentrate on the less important aspects of acting, and these elements typically include some form of self-flagellation or an experience that imposes upon oneself extreme unease or mental instability. However, in the career of an actor, it must mainly focus on the internal work.”

A World of Imitators

Frankly, this sounds as if the actor has emerged from seclusion and found himself aghast at the world that has been created in his image. When you are widely considered one of the greatest performers in history, and your approach involves headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or spending two days in isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by trying to mimic their idol.

In other words, we now live in an environment populated by half-cocked imitators of Day-Lewis who want nothing more than to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they put into their roles. On the milder side of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar for House of Gucci that she dedicated the entire promotion attempting to persuade people that she became functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.

Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who decided to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) through sending “disturbing” gifts to fellow cast members. These, depending on who you ask, included deceased animals to anal beads and personal hygiene products, though Leto denied those worst excesses. And then, of course, there is Jim Carrey, who went so deep as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that they literally managed in creating a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties to the utmost for his colleagues.

The Modern Method Practitioners

The main practitioner of the Method at the moment seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly Day-Lewis’s assistant), whose process during Succession was so rigorously detailed that it became the subject of a derisive magazine feature, full of quotes from individuals who were worried for his behaviour (“The toll on himself that worries me,” remarked Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by it (“I recall him causing everyone else roll their eyes,” said an anonymous cast member).

The actor says he ‘never intended to stop acting, truly’

There are so many other examples. Andrew Garfield went celibate for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio slept in a dead animal for The Revenant. There’s a fighting chance that actor Austin Butler continues to talk in the style of Elvis, years following that film came out. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his craft.

A Noble Yet Challenging Battle

Moreover, while his fightback against method detractors might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Perhaps if he wishes to remind people what method acting is, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply start making additional movies. Certainly everyone would support that idea.