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

The Mythos Surrounding His Method

Largely, this legend centers on his preferred approach to roles. As someone known for disappears into the roles he plays – for instance, while filming the Lincoln biopic, he had Steven Spielberg call him “Mr President” throughout the shoot – audiences has become more fascinated with his process. Is it true he actually sent messages to co-star Sally Field as Abraham Lincoln? Did he only eat animals he’d killed for Last of the Mohicans? Did he demand receiving food via spoon for My Left Foot?

Extreme acting methods: has the public fallen out of love with actorly excess?

Now, Daniel Day-Lewis has returned to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, promoting his latest movie Anemone. He is taking this chance to express his anger at how the Method technique is perceived. “I’m a little cross nowadays when I hear various individuals talking carelessly and saying things like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which I think suggests that a person’s behaving like a lunatic in a drastic way,” he told the New York Times. “Everyone often concentrate on the less important details of the work, and those details always seem to involve some form of self-flagellation or a situation that imposes upon oneself a severe discomfort or mental instability. But of course, in the career for a performer, it has to principally be about the internal work.”

A World of Imitators

To be honest, this sounds like Day-Lewis has come out from his retreat only to discover shocked by the world that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are widely considered one of the greatest performers to ever work, and your approach involves striking a prop until you break your nose (in Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation without food or water (during In the Name of the Father), then it stands to reason that other actors will attempt to fill that vacuum by imitating your hero.

Essentially, we now live in a landscape full of half-cocked Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the extensive degree of effort they put into a character. At the shallow end of the pool we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to win an Oscar with House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign trying to convince everyone that she transformed into functionally Italian for a year and a half in preparation.

Then we have Jared Leto, who chose to deeply embed himself in the character as the Joker (in Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to fellow cast members. These items, depending on who you ask, range from deceased animals to intimate objects and personal hygiene products, though the actor refuted the most extreme claims. Then, naturally, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully into Andy Kaufman during Man on the Moon that filmmakers literally managed to get a full-length documentary out of B-roll of him making life to the utmost for everyone around him.

The Modern Method Practitioners

The main practitioner of the Method at the moment would appear to be Jeremy Strong (formerly an assistant to Day-Lewis), whose process during Succession was so laboriously intensive that it formed the basis of a derisive New Yorker profile, full of quotes from individuals who were worried about his conduct (“It’s the cost to himself that worries me,” said Brian Cox) or annoyed beyond all measure by his actions (“I remember [him] making everyone else to react with exasperation,” stated an unnamed co-star).

The actor claims he ‘did not plan to retire, truly’

We have so many other examples. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex for six months for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside an animal carcass during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that actor Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after that film came out. Each of these instances, in part, aims to evoke the seriousness with which Day-Lewis takes his work.

A Noble Yet Challenging Battle

Moreover, while his fightback against method detractors could be commendable, a short publicity tour may prove insufficient to change anyone’s mind, not to mention their practices. Maybe if he wants to make audiences recall what method acting is, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing additional movies. Certainly everyone would get behind that.