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It’s been a long while since the public saw or heard from Daniel Day-Lewis. After he statement in 2017 that he would cease to work as an actor, just before the debut of The Phantom Thread, Day-Lewis quietly faded from view. Yet, during his hiatus, his legend has only grown.

The Legend of His Method

Largely, this reputation revolves around his favored approach to roles. Being an actor known for immerses himself in the roles he plays – for instance, during Lincoln, he had Steven Spielberg address him as “Mr President” throughout the shoot – the world has grown increasingly obsessed with how he works. Did he really send texts to Sally Field in character as Lincoln? Was it accurate that he consumed solely game he hunted during Last of the Mohicans? Did he insist on receiving food via spoon while filming My Left Foot?

Madness in their method: have we lost interest with actorly excess?

Currently, Daniel Day-Lewis is back to public attention, somewhat reluctantly, for his new film Anemone. He is using this to vocalise his anger at how method acting is perceived. “I am somewhat annoyed nowadays to hear all kinds of people gobbling off and using phrases like ‘fully embraced the Method’, which seems suggests that someone is acting insane in a drastic way,” he stated to a major publication. “People tends to focus on superficial details of the work, and these elements always seem to involve some form of self-punishment or a situation that causes extreme unease or psychological strain. However, in the career for a performer, it has to principally be about the internal work.”

An Industry of Imitators

Frankly, it appears like Day-Lewis has come out from his retreat and found himself shocked by the world that has developed mirroring his methods. When you are regarded as among the best performers in history, and your process includes headbutting a dummy until you break your nose (for Gangs of New York) or enduring two days in isolation without food or water (for In the Name of the Father), it’s natural that fellow performers will want to emulate that example by imitating their idol.

In other words, we exist in an environment full of imperfect Day-Lewis impersonators who want nothing more than to show the world the sheer amount of dedication they put into a character. On the milder side of this trend we have people like Lady Gaga, who was so desperate to earn an Academy Award for House of Gucci that she dedicated the whole campaign attempting to persuade people that she became an Italian native over 18 months as preparation.

Additionally, there is Jared Leto, who chose to immerse himself in the character as the Joker (for Suicide Squad) by sending “horrifying” gifts to fellow cast members. These, depending on who you ask, included dead pigs and rats to intimate objects and used condoms, though Leto denied the most extreme claims. Then, of course, we have Jim Carrey, who immersed himself so fully as Andy Kaufman for Man on the Moon that filmmakers succeeded in creating a feature-length documentary from behind-the-scenes footage of him causing difficulties as impossible as he could for everyone around him.

Contemporary Followers of the Method

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

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

There are numerous additional cases. Andrew Garfield abstained from sex over half a year while preparing for Silence. Leonardo DiCaprio rested inside a dead animal during The Revenant. It’s quite possible that Austin Butler still speaks in the style of Elvis, three years after the movie’s release. All of this, in part, aims to evoke the dedication in which Day-Lewis takes his work.

A Noble But Uphill Battle

And, while his fightback to critics of the Method might be noble, a brief promotional cycle may prove insufficient to alter perceptions, not to mention their practices. Maybe if he wants to remind people what method acting is, or to demonstrate what it can achieve, then the optimal strategy for Day-Lewis is to simply begin producing more films. Surely everyone would get behind that.