Even Martin Scorsese, possibly the most important American filmmaker of the last half-century, has underappreciated and underseen films, as is the case with his 2016 historical epic Silence. The star of The Amazing Spider-Man, Andrew Garfield, and Star Wars actor, Adam Driver, played Jesuit priests who journey to Japan in the 17th century in search of their mentor.
Consider Drew Barrymore’s dissatisfaction with at least some of Andrew Garfield’s method acting choices while filming Martin Scorsese’s Silence. Garfield said in August to Marc Maron that he refrained from sex for six months to play a Jesuit priest in Scorsese’s religious thriller. What was Barrymore’s response to this statement? “Yeah, so?”
Barrymore later mentioned Christian Bale and Matthew McConaughey as actors that use method acting to great effect. Barrymore understands why actors must “transform and fully commit” to a role for the duration of filming.
Drew Barrymore trolls Andrew Garfield for being celibate
During the September 20 broadcast of The Drew Barrymore Show, co-host Ross Matthews said, “I get abstaining from sex, I mean, I did it my entire 20s, right?” “What’s wrong with me that six months doesn’t seem like a long time?” Barrymore responded. ‘Yeah so?’ I thought.
“That’s the headline, we buried the lede there,” Matthews continued. “Drew can go for six months, no big deal.“
“I definitely [did] on certain projects, like when I did Grey Gardens, this film I did where I played beloved real-life woman Edie Beale,” Barrymore added. “I was so nervous I didn’t chit chat with everybody on set, I just really stayed in character.”
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Andrew Garfield’s statement on being celibate
During an appearance on Maron’s “WTF” podcast, Andrew Garfield stated that there are “a lot of misconceptions about what method acting is,” adding, “People are still acting in that way, and it’s not about being an asshole to everyone on set.” It’s actually just about living truthfully under imagined circumstances, being really nice to the crew simultaneously, and being a normal human being, and being able to drop it when you need to and staying in it when you want to stay in it.”
“I’m kind of bothered by this idea that ‘method acting is fucking bullshit,’” “No, I don’t think you know what method acting is if you’re calling it bullshit, or you just worked with someone who claims to be a method actor who isn’t actually acting the method at all. It’s also very private. I don’t want people to see the fucking pipes of my toilet. I don’t want them to see how I’m making the sausage.”
According to the Lee Strasberg Theatre and Film Institute, method acting is a technique invented in the 1900s by Russian theatrical director Konstantin Stanislavski and subsequently developed by famed acting coach Lee Strasberg.
According to the institute, it encourages performers to use their “physical, mental, and emotional self” to build a persona while drawing on their own personal experiences for the job. Garfield went celibate and fasted for extended periods during the six months he spent preparing for Silence.
Source: Variety
