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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 work as an actor, just before the debut of Phantom Thread, the actor withdrew from the spotlight. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend expanded further.

The Legend Surrounding His Method

Primarily, this legend revolves around his favored style of working. Being an actor who famously immerses himself in his characters – for example, while filming the Lincoln biopic, reportedly asked the director call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has become increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely animals he’d killed during The Last of the Mohicans? And did he demand being spoon-fed for My Left Foot?

Madness in their method: have we fallen out of love with over-the-top performances?

Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back in the limelight, with some hesitation, for his new film Anemone. And he is using this to express his anger at how the Method technique is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed these days to hear various individuals gobbling off and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems suggests that a person’s acting insane in a drastic way,” he stated to 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 an experience that causes extreme unease or psychological strain. But of course, in the career for a performer, it must principally be about the inner transformation.”

An Industry of Imitators

To be honest, this sounds as if Day-Lewis has emerged from seclusion only to discover shocked by the world that has been created in his image. If you’re regarded as among the best performers to ever work, and your approach includes headbutting a dummy to the point of injury (in Gangs of New York) or spending two days in solitary confinement without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating their idol.

In other words, we exist in a landscape full of imperfect imitators of Day-Lewis who strive only to demonstrate the sheer amount of effort they invest in their roles. At the shallow end of this trend there are performers such as Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she spent the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.

Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself into the role as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” presents to fellow cast members. These items, according to various accounts, range from dead pigs and rats to anal beads and used condoms, although the actor refuted those worst excesses. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded in creating a feature-length documentary out of B-roll of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for his colleagues.

Contemporary Followers of the Method

The foremost practitioner of the Method currently seems to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process while filming Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the basis of a derisive magazine feature, full of quotes from individuals who were either concerned about his conduct (“It’s the cost on himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or extremely irritated by his actions (“I recall him causing others to react with exasperation,” stated an anonymous cast member).

The actor claims he ‘never intended to retire, truly’

We have numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass for The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler still speaks like Elvis Presley, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, is meant to invoke the seriousness in which Day-Lewis takes his work.

An Admirable Yet Challenging Fight

Moreover, although his rebuttal to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their behaviour. Maybe if he wishes to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to show them what it can achieve, then Day-Lewis’s best bet is to just start making more films. Surely everyone would get behind that.