Method acting can lead to outstanding performances, with some of the greatest actors working today practicing the technique, but it can also lead to disaster, bringing down the quality of the whole movie. Method acting is a technique actors use to better tap into their character. This can be done in a range of different ways, such as learning a character's trade or staying in character between shoots. The best examples include when Daniel Day-Lewis took method acting too far by living as somebody would in the 1800s for Gangs of New York (and catching pneumonia as a result) and Leonardo DiCaprio actually eating raw bison liver in The Revenant (per Vanity Fair).
While method acting is often considered an admirable, it has also come under scrutiny, and a huge number of actors have recently criticized method acting, including Mads Mikkelson, David Harbour, Robert Pattinson, and Samuel L. Jackson. Jackson said of method acting, "It’s a job of playing make-believe. You do it effectively and you do it in a way that’s not harmful to you because it’s a safe space." The following examples of method acting were not only bad, but they also affected the quality of the movie, and the actors' technique disrupted the movie's production too. In these cases, if the actors weren't method acting, the movies might have turned out better.
10 Ashton Kutcher In Jobs (2013)
Sitcom star Ashton Kutcher is not the likeliest method actor, but he took the practice to the extreme for the Steve Jobs biopic, Jobs, in which he played the titular Apple co-founder. Kutcher adopted Jobs' whole way of life including embracing Buddhism, but it also included a "dumb" diet according to Kutcher's wife, Mila Kunis (via E!). The actor was hospitalized twice due to pancreatitis after only eating grapes. Unfortunately, the sacrifice didn't pay off on screen, as Jobs received overwhelmingly negative reviews, and critics noted that Kutcher wasn't remotely believable as Steve Jobs.
9 Nicolas Cage In Ghost Rider (2007)
Nicolas Cage is known for putting a unique spin on roles, and he even came up with his own style of acting he calls "Nouveau Shamanic," which includes method acting. Cage's method has worked for movies like Leaving Las Vegas, which earned him an Academy Award, but not for Ghost Rider. Just like with Morbius, it seems unnecessary to method act for a hammy superhero movie, but Cage method acted for Ghost Rider by painting himself as a "voodoo icon" and sewing 1000-year-old artifacts into his costume. While Cage has always been known for over-the-top movie performances, it didn't work for Ghost Rider, and the tone was all over the place.
8 Aaron Eckhart In Rabbit Hole (2010)
Rabbit Hole is about a couple, played by Nicole Kidman and Aaron Eckhart, dealing with the grief of the death of their four-year-old son. To prepare for the role, Eckhart visited a real-life support group where he not only listened but pretended that he had also lost a child (via Us Magazine), and he even had an emotional breakdown. The move was wildly insensitive, but Eckhart believed that he could better tap into his character this way. However, while Kidman was nominated for a Golden Globe for her performance in the movie, Eckhart couldn't keep up with her, and that fake grief was not only insulting, but it didn't pay off either.
7 Divine In Pink Flamingos (1972)
The John Waters-directed Pink Flamingos is something of a cult classic, disliked by general audiences but finding a loyal fanbase in the years since release. However, there are obvious reasons why the movie is so off-putting to general audiences. Pink Flamingos follows Babs Johnson (Divine) and her family as they compete with a couple to be named the filthiest people alive, and Divine used method acting in the role. In a scene where the character eats fresh dog feces, which could have been created using different foods to look like excrement, real feces was used (via Far Out). The whole of Pink Flamingos is in poor taste, but the movie is proud of it.
6 Shia LaBeouf In Charlie Countryman (2013)
Shia LaBeouf has been known to take method acting to the extreme in the past, such as performing unsimulated sex in Nymphomaniac (per MTV) and pulling out his teeth for Fury (via Entertainment Tonight). However, while those movies were highly praised by critics and LaBeouf's commitment to the role added something to them, his method acting for Charlie Countryman was misguided. The actor took acid for a whole 24 hours to prepare for one scene in the surreal romantic drama (via The Guardian), but that just served to make the movie feel more overstuffed and nonsensical. It also makes little sense why LaBeouf dropped acid when the character took ecstasy in the scene.
5 Joaquin Phoenix In I'm Still Here (2010)
I'm Still Here was marketed as a documentary after Joaquin Phoneix "retired" from acting to become a rapper. Despite Phoenix appearing in a now infamous interview on Letterman (via YouTube) where he maintained his new persona, it all turned out to be a stunt. In reality, I'm Still Here is mockumentary of sorts and a satirical look at celebrity culture. However, between the fact that few people believed that Phoenix had really retired from acting and that his "character" was obnoxious and mean-spirited, which is how he reportedly acted for months while filming the movie, I'm Still Here fell flat.
4 Johnny Depp in The Rum Diary (2011)
Johnny Depp is known for method acting, and he even used the technique when playing Hunter S. Thompson (who wrote The Rum Diary) in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. It worked out well for the surreal 1998 movie, but not so much for The Rum Diary. Depp plays a journalist struggling with alcoholism, and to get into character, he reportedly consumed Thompson's favorite alcohol during production (via Mashed) despite taking a vow of sobriety with director Bruce Robinson (via Daily Express). Being drunk at work is unwarranted, let alone an actor breaking a vow of sobriety to do it. If anything, Depp's method acting to play the rambling character made the movie worse.
3 Daniel Day-Lewis in Nine (2009)
Daniel Day-Lewis takes method acting to the extreme with every single movie he stars in, whether it's practicing dressmaking for two years for Phantom Thread or staying in character as Abraham Lincoln for Lincoln. Unfortunately, Nine is the one time it didn't work out. Nine is a musical about an Italian filmmaker, and Day-Lewis would send other actors handwritten letters in character as the filmmaker (via Vulture). However, Day-Lewis also sent Fergie letters, and Day-Lewis' character would never have known who Fergie's character was. It's the one time the actor got sloppy with his method acting, and it's not-so-coincidentally his most negatively received movie.
2 Gary Oldman in Bram Stoker's Dracula (1992)
Tons of odd stories and rumors have come from the production of Bram Stoker's Dracula, most notably ones surrounding Gary Oldman's method acting as the titular vampire. It was reported that Oldman slept in a coffin during production, but he was "a danger to work with" (via Far Out) and also said nasty things to the actors when the cameras weren't rolling to get better performances out of his costars too. While Bram Stoker's Dracula isn't a bad film, it could have been a lot better if there wasn't so much on-set tension caused by Oldman's method acting.
1 Jared Leto In Suicide Squad (2016)
Jared Leto method acts in almost all of his movies, but his techniques often come off as misguided, especially when they affect his castmates more than his own performance. It was reported that Leto sent his Suicide Squad castmates used condoms during production (via Far Out), none of which would typically help him get into the character of the gangster rapper version of the Joker. Leto's performance was the most criticized part of the film. Leto also stayed in character during the production of Morbius, which meant taking 45-minute toilet breaks due to using crutches, wasting time and money, which are two things the negatively received movie desperately needed more of.
Sources: E!, Far Out, Us Magazine, Vanity Fair, Vulture
