Daniel Day-Lewis
Sir Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis (born 29 April 1957) is an English retired actor.[1][2][3] Often described as one of the greatest actors in the history of cinema,[4][5][6][7] he received numerous accolades throughout his career, which spanned over four decades, including three Academy Awards, four BAFTA Awards, three Screen Actors Guild Awards and two Golden Globe Awards. In 2014, Day-Lewis received a knighthood for services to drama.[8]
Daniel Day-Lewis
29 April 1957
- United Kingdom
- Ireland
Actor
1971–1997, 2000–2017
Isabelle Adjani (1989–1995)
3
- Cecil Day-Lewis (father)
- Jill Balcon (mother)
- Tamasin Day-Lewis (sister)
- Michael Balcon (grandfather)
- Miranda Shearer (niece)
- Arthur Miller (father-in-law)
- Inge Morath (mother-in-law)
Born and raised in London, Day-Lewis excelled on stage at the National Youth Theatre before being accepted at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, which he attended for three years. Despite his traditional training at the Bristol Old Vic, he is considered a method actor, known for his constant devotion to and research of his roles.[9][10] Protective of his private life, he rarely grants interviews and makes very few public appearances.[11]
Day-Lewis shifted between theatre and film for most of the early 1980s, joining the Royal Shakespeare Company and playing Romeo Montague in Romeo and Juliet and Flute in A Midsummer Night's Dream. Playing the title role in Hamlet at the National Theatre in London in 1989, he left the stage midway through a performance after breaking down during a scene where the ghost of Hamlet's father appears before him—this was his last appearance on the stage.[12] After supporting film roles in Gandhi (1982) and The Bounty (1984), he earned acclaim for his breakthrough performances in My Beautiful Laundrette (1985), A Room with a View (1985), and The Unbearable Lightness of Being (1988).
He earned Academy Awards for his roles in My Left Foot (1989), There Will Be Blood (2007), and Lincoln (2012). His other Oscar-nominated roles were in In the Name of the Father (1993), Gangs of New York (2002), and Phantom Thread (2017). Other notable films include The Last of the Mohicans (1992), The Age of Innocence (1993), The Crucible (1996), and The Boxer (1997). He retired from acting from 1997 to 2000, taking up a new profession as an apprentice shoe-maker in Italy. Although he returned to acting, he announced his retirement again in 2017.[3][13]
Technique and reputation
Day-Lewis is considered a method actor, known for his constant devotion to and research of his roles.[9][10] Displaying a "mercurial intensity", he would often remain completely in character throughout the shooting schedules of his films, even to the point of adversely affecting his health.[7][36] He is one of the most selective actors in the film industry, having starred in only six films since 1998, with as many as five years between roles.[78] Protective of his private life, he rarely grants interviews, and makes very few public appearances.[11]
Following his third Oscar win in 2013, there was much debate about Day-Lewis's standing among the greatest actors in film history.[4][5][6][79] Joe Queenan of The Guardian remarked, "Arguing whether Daniel Day-Lewis is a greater actor than Laurence Olivier, or Richard Burton, or Marlon Brando, is like arguing whether Messi is more talented than Pelé, whether Napoleon Bonaparte edges out Alexander the Great as a military genius."[6] When Day-Lewis himself was asked what it was like to be "the world's greatest actor", he replied, "It's daft isn't it? It changes all the time."[80]
Widely respected among his peers, in June 2017, Michael Simkins of The Guardian wrote, "In this glittering cesspit we call the acting profession, there are plenty of rival thesps who, through sheer luck or happenstance, seem to have the career we ourselves could have had if only the cards had fallen differently. But Day-Lewis is, by common consent, even in the most sourly disposed green rooms – a class apart. We shall not look upon his like again – at least for a bit. Performers of his mercurial intensity come along once in a generation."[7]