KRISTEN STEWART: MEN METHOD ACT BECAUSE THEY’RE EMBARRASSED
Men prefer method acting because they find performing more “embarrassing” than women, Kristen Stewart has said.
The Oscar-nominated actress, 35, told the New York Times that many of Hollywood’s leading men use method techniques because acting is by nature quite “embarrassing and unmasculine”.
She said: “There’s no bravado in suggesting that you’re a mouthpiece for someone else’s ideas. It’s inherently submissive. Have you ever heard of a female actor that was method?”
Stewart spoke about the issue during a discussion about Marlon Brando’s mispronunciation of “Krypton” in the 1978 film Superman.
The actress, who has recently made her feature-length directorial debut with The Chronology of Water, said: “Brando sounds like a hero, doesn’t he?
“If a woman did that, it would be different. If you have to do 50 push-ups before your close-up or refuse to say a word a certain way – I mean, Brando…I’m not coming for him.
“There’s a common act that happens before the acting happens on set: If they can protrude out of the vulnerability and feel like a gorilla pounding their chest before they cry on camera, it’s a little less embarrassing.”
She continued: “It also makes it seem like a magic trick, like it is so impossible to do what you’re doing that nobody else could do it.”
She made the comments after a row between Sir Daniel Day-Lewis and Brian Cox last month over method acting.
Cox railed against the “f---ing annoying” practice and criticised his former co-star Jeremy Strong for indulging in method acting because of the influence of Sir Daniel, known for his uncompromising method techniques.
Sir Daniel, who has won a record three Oscars for a male actor, then took the unusual step of publicly complaining about Cox getting on his “soapbox” and starting a “handbags at dawn” row.
Cox has previously expressed his impatience with this approach, characterising it as so much “American s---”.
The Scottish star repeatedly criticised his Succession co-star Strong, who was known to stay in character as Kendall Roy in the hit show and isolate himself from fellow cast members in order to retain his character’s identity.
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In one interview, Cox claimed that this was a “particularly American disease”, saying it was an “inability to separate yourself off while you’re doing the job” and claimed that Strong picked it up after working as Sir Daniel’s personal assistant.
Sir Daniel, meanwhile, has expressed his frustration with method acting being “misrepresented”, saying that “it’s invariably attached to the idea of some kind of lunacy”.
The approach of adopting the character’s identity rather than simply representing them was brought to film by Brando, who employed it for his 1951 breakthrough film role in A Streetcar Named Desire.
2025-12-08T14:25:43Z