Method acting, properly known as “The Method” was advanced and introduced to American acting studios in the 1930s by Lee Strasberg and Elia Kazan. However, the technique was originally invented in the early 1900s by Konstantin Stanislavski, a Russian actor and theatre director. Stanislavski did not call the technique method acting back then, but his ideas created a model to help actors build believable characters. His approach encouraged actors to draw from their own personal experiences and memories to garner real emotions and connect with the characters. This technique starkly contrasted the more traditional, theatrical and classical acting of that time.
Lee Strasberg suggested that the actor should fully inhabit the role of the character throughout and not just on stage or in front of the camera. A method actor is not simply playing a role – they are being the character. They feel the character’s emotions instead of acting them out. They achieve this through exploring their own experiences and feelings. The result is an incredible performance wherein the audience is completely drawn into the world of the character.
This is not without risk for the actor though. They must be prepared to face trauma during the process of delving into their own psyches in search of the character’s truth.
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In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, Natalie Portman characterized method acting as an indulgence that only certain people can enjoy. She suggested that the technique is only viable for people whose job as an actor is seen as more important than the other roles in their life.
“I’ve gotten very into roles, but I think it’s honestly a luxury that women can’t afford,” she said of method acting. “I don’t think that children or partners would be very understanding of, you know, me making everyone call me ‘Jackie Kennedy’ all the time,” she said, referring to her Oscar-nominated role in the 2016 biopic “Jackie.”
It is not possible to check out of reality when an individual has dependents. Portman told the Wall Street Journal that she started each day at 7 a.m. “I wake up the kids and get them ready for school — not very exciting — make them breakfast, take them to school and come back and walk the dogs.”
According to Portman, going full method actor would not align with her role as a mother. Regardless, she does intensive preparation for her roles. She won an Academy Award for her portrayal of a ballerina who takes commitment to extreme lengths in Black Swan. To get into character for the movie she underwent gruelling training as a ballet dancer, training for five hours a day for several months, even reshaping her diet to just almonds and carrots.
In the critically acclaimed May December, she plays the character of Elizabeth Berry, an actress who dedicates herself to closely studying the life of a controversial woman named Gracie Atherton-Yoo in preparation of playing her in a film. However, as time passes Elizabeth finds herself almost becoming Gracie as she delves deeper into her home life and marriage.
Her performance as Jackie Kennedy in the film Jackie was intense, weird and slightly distressing but her preparation didn’t go to the same extreme. While having portrayed characters who dangerously over-commit, Portman herself stops short of method acting. She is still able to separate herself from the character she is playing during production.
Charlize Theron has previously described method acting as ‘exhausting’, adding that it left her ‘miserable’ when she tried her hand at it for her role in The Devil’s Advocate at the director’s behest. The director was a fan of method acting, and encouraged everyone to remain in character throughout production.
She described the process by stating, “I realized on that film that that was definitely not a process that was gonna work for me. There was something so exhausting about it. My life was miserable. I wasn’t happy. And then of course you worry because then you’re like, well, if I don’t do that, then maybe I won’t be as good as the Marlon Brando’s and Monty Clift’s’ and you read all these biographies… And then I did some work, non-method, and I was actually really happy with the work. I think for me, having the energy to be able to go a lot further in darker material is way more helpful than being exhausted. When I’m exhausted, I’m just tired. I almost don’t want to go in the dark room. So I made it a real discipline. I think dance really helped me with this. I work, I leave it behind.” Ultimately, this experience helped her realize that the approach wasn’t for her and she needed to find what worked for her.
Adding to this, Kirsten Dunst has tried various techniques to enhance her acting, but never method acting, stating “What, am I gonna be like that with my kids when I come home? Speaking in an accent? Like, honestly, I can’t do that. It seems like something only men can afford to do.”
It is generally very difficult and logistically impractical for a lot of women actors to completely immerse themselves in this intensive technique as their male counterparts might famously do, since the majority of domestic responsibilities still predominantly fall on women along with them being the primary caregivers for their children.
Most of the actors that come to mind when one thinks of “method acting” are men. Jeremy Strong, Jared Leto, Leonardo DiCaprio, Daniel Day-Lewis, Jim Carrey, Christian Bale, etc. Actresses such as Jane Fonda and Ellen Burstyn also studied the method technique, but are not known for pulling over-the-top stunts like their male counterparts.
Although the concept originated as a process of internal transformation that involved creating and inhabiting a new emotional landscape, today it is largely thought of as something flashier and more external: refusal to break character even off-set, or a determination to do punishing things to get in the zone. For instance, Daniel Day Lewis caught and killed his own food for Last of the Mohicans and lived in solitary confinement for In the Name of the Father, Jared Leto sent his co-stars creepy gifts while preparing for Suicide Squad, and Jeremy Strong begged to be tear-gassed while filming The Trial of Chicago 7.
A lot of accounts of the method style focus on male actors misbehaving under the guise of the character. Dustin Hoffman who was playing opposite a young Meryl Streep in Kramer vs. Kramer, slapped her and taunted her about her partner who had just died of cancer before the camera was rolling, to elicit real tears. Daniel Day-Lewis was pushed around in a wheelchair and spoon-fed by the crew of My Left Foot. Jared Leto gifted his costars a range of disturbing items as mentioned above.
Men constantly get away with bad behavior, but for women, labels like “difficult” or “high-maintenance” can tank their careers. Audiences have a harder time separating the art from the female artist. Men’s extreme dedication is often lauded with awards and publicity, while women’s career paths are more frequently perceived as conflicting with family life.
Multiple actors have weighed in on the debate surrounding method acting.
However, presenting a different perspective, Evi Stamatiou, Senior Lecturer in Acting for Stage and Screen at the University of East London, argues in her research that method acting can empower marginalized social groups including women due to it prioritizing the actor’s internal process and real-life experience over the script and fictional character.
Vakhtangov, a Russian theater director and acting teacher, considered it key for the actor to find emotional and experiential associations between themselves and their character so as to bring their own authentic experience to their acting. Actors utilise visualisation exercises in order to discover their own emotional “buttons” that they can then push as and when appropriate for a role.
Stamatiou suggests her students to only use method acting to solve a problem such as an emotionally demanding scene rather than employing it throughout a film or play. This means that they can choose when to let go of their own emotional buttons.
Contrary to Portman’s comments, she believes that method acting can deepen women’s experiences both on and off screen. A role could, for instance, inspire an actor to find in themselves a more self-caring mother or a more assertive partner. In her view, method acting should be envisioned, not as taking work home, but as taking home a playful sense of self-knowledge and self-exploration.
