It sounds like Daniel Day-Lewis is serious about his retirement from acting and won’t be returning, at least according to his longtime director Jim Sheridan. The Irish filmmaker directed three of Day-Lewis’ most prominent films: “My Left Foot” (1989), “In the Name of the Father” (1993) and “The Boxer” (1997). Day-Lewis won the Oscar for best actor with “My Left Foot” and was also nominated for “In the Name of the Father.”
“He says he’s done. I keep talking to him,” Sheridan told ScreenDaily on the topic of Day-Lewis staying retired. “I’d love to do something with him again. He’s like everybody else. He opens up the streamers and there’s seven thousand choices, none of them are good. Film has been moved out of the public domain into a private domain – you have a remote, you can stop it. It’s not the same experience. It’d be great to see Daniel coming back and doing something because he’s so good.”
Day-Lewis announced his retirement from acting in June 2017, several months before the release of Paul Thomas Anderson’s “Phantom Thread.” That film, which garnered Day-Lewis yet another Oscar nomination for best actor, turned out to be his final movie.
“Daniel Day-Lewis will no longer be working as an actor,” the actor’s spokesperson said in a statement at the time. “He is immensely grateful to all of his collaborators and audiences over the many years. This is a private decision and neither he nor his representatives will make any further comment on this subject. ”
Later reflecting on his decision in an interview with W magazine, Day-Lewis said that “before making [‘Phantom Thread’], I didn’t know I was going to stop acting.”
Part of the reason Day-Lewis announced his retirement in a public statement was so he’d have a harder time getting out of it. He wanted to “draw a line” in the sand and make concrete plans to phase out of Hollywood.
“I knew it was uncharacteristic to put out a statement,” Day-Lewis said. “But I did want to draw a line. I didn’t want to get sucked back into another project. All my life, I’ve mouthed off about how I should stop acting, and I don’t know why it was different this time, but the impulse to quit took root in me, and that became a compulsion. It was something I had to do.”
Day-Lewis recently attended the National Board of Review awards and reunited with his “Gangs of New York” director Martin Scorsese, who stoked rumors about the actor possibly un-retiring by teasing a future collaboration between them.
“Thank you, Daniel. To receive this honor presented by Daniel is just an honor in itself,” Scorsese said while accepting the best director prize. “We did two films together and it’s one of the greatest experiences of my life, I must say. Maybe there’s time for one more. Maybe! He’s the best.”
Day-Lewis would follow his Oscar win for Sheridan’s “My Left Foot” with two more wins in the category thanks to “There Will Be Blood” and “Lincoln”
