Society

Birthday

Daniel Day-Lewis, three Oscars and an inimitable method: the 66th anniversary of one of the greatest actors

Londoner, after his theatrical training he became one of the most rigorous and quoted actors in international cinema. Awarded Best Actor in a Leading Role for "My Left Foot," "The Oilman" and "Lincoln," he said goodbye to the scene in 2018

29/04/2023

Antonio Bonanata

Sixty-six years and three Oscars (six nominations): Daniel Day-Lewis, born in London on April 29, 1957, is celebrated today as one of the greatest actors in the history of cinema. Although he has now retired from the stage: he had announced it in 2018, after having also retired from the theater almost thirty years earlier.

Actors like him, precious and enlightened, would always be needed. And perhaps for this reason, now that he turns 66, Daniel Day-Lewis remains an example, a beacon, a model for generations of actors. A method, his, original and as a true "interpreter", just like the one who does not limit himself to "making" a character but who is transformed, literally, body and soul, in the figure to which he lends his face and voice.

Some examples: for the film The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988) he learned the Czech language without leaving the character for the eight months of filming. As for Nine (2009), inspired by Fellini's 8 and <>/<>, he learned Italian, he who is a native English speaker, son of a poet and writer with Irish origins and a prose actress of Jewish origin.

A method from Actor's Studio, his, despite having studied at the Bristol Old Vic in his hometown (his original training is therefore theatrical). For the role of Christy Brown in My Left Foot, Jim Sheridan's film that earned him (in 1989) the first Oscar for Best Actor, he was, taken to the bathroom or to bed, just like a real invalid. To interpret the Irish painter who had only the use of his left foot to paint, in fact, he learned to use the limb to hold a brush or a pen, coming to crack two ribs for the uncomfortable position he had assumed during all the shooting.

In short, a challenge to every take: for The Last of the Mohicans (1992) he learned to hunt in the forest and build canoes; For In the Name of the Father (1993) he spent nights in solitary confinement in an abandoned prison, staying awake three days straight before the interrogation scene. For The Seduction of Evil (1996) he built himself a wooden house and did not wash for three months.

And then, again: to shoot The Boxer (1997) he trained a year and a half with a former boxer. In Gangs of New York, Martin Scorsese's masterpiece of 2002, he became an apprentice butcher to learn the trade and know how to cut meat, without covering himself with warm clothes despite the cold (as they would not have been consistent with the historical period in which the film was set); A fatal choice: he fell ill with pneumonia, without however treating himself with modern drugs.

For his second Oscar, won with Il Petroliere (2007), he learned to use old machinery to extract oil, even breaking a rib (for the second time): he did not want stunt doubles. The third statuette for best actor comes five years later with Lincoln (by Steven Spielberg): he came to learn the exact accent of the president of the United States and stayed in the places where he was born and raised. Throughout the film, he called himself Mr President by Spielberg and the crew, just as if he were the head of the White House assassinated in 1865. For Il filo nascosto, the last film he starred in, in 2017, he sewed himself an entire tailoring suit, all by hand.

During his long career, however, he took a break from 1997 to 2001: absent from the scene, he moved to Florence to work as a shoemaker in an artisan workshop. At that time, on Fridays, she joined her son in Paris. But, with method and professionalism workaholic, every Monday morning he showed up regularly at work, punctual and precise.

He shot "only" twenty films, just six from 1997 to 2017, when he bids farewell to the scenes. Happy birthday, Master Daniel.