Daniel Day-Lewis Once Called Ryan Gosling 1 of the Few Young Actors He Admired
Ryan Gosling has made a large number of fans over the years thanks to his critically acclaimed performances. At one point, he’d even gotten acting veteran Day-Lewis to take notice of him, who sung Gosling’s praises.
Daniel Day-Lewis once named his favorite actors
Day-Lewis is an actor that many look up to, both audiences and film stars alike. But the three-time Oscar-winner has a list of actors he’s always admired himself. In a resurfaced interview with Port (via Contact Music), the actor shared that he was in the midst of making such a list. But rattling off his favorite performers was a task that was harder than he thought it would be.
“I’m gathering all these things to me like a crazy hoarder, arms around them, fingers clasped, sweeping them towards me, penning them under the roof of this magazine – or like a flailing game show winner given three minutes to ransack the shelves of their favourite department store, who now sits panting on the floor to examine the surprising sum-total of their plunder,” he said.
Still, there were some notable names on Day-Lewis’ list in progress. Robert De Niro, Marlon Brando, and Laurence Olivier all managed to make the cut. Although Day-Lewis noted that Olivier might have been an even better actor if he’d kept his attitude in check. Perhaps less popular names like British TV and film stars Philip Davis and Montgomery Clift managed a slot on his list as well.
Daniel Day-Lewis once called Ryan Gosling one of the few young actors he admired
As he’d gotten older, Day-Lewis found himself working alongside young actors of a newer generation. Leonardo DiCaprio was one of these performers, who he managed to work with in the film Gangs of New York. But The Batman star Paul Dano was another young actor he ended up working with at the time that Day-Lewis admired. Dano and Day-Lewis collaborated on There Will Be Blood and The Ballad of Jack and Rose.
“We never really spoke, and we never met socially during that time because the work led us in different directions. He understood implicitly, as I did, that it was important to keep that distance between us. But we got to know each other a little bit after that and I like him so much as a man – which always helps – but as an actor I think he’s undoubtedly one of the most promising young actors working at the moment,” Day-Lewis once told Chicago Movie Mag.
Apart from Dano, however, he was also impressed by the works of other performers he hadn’t worked with before.
“There’s a few really good ones… Emile Hirsch and Ryan Gosling. I don’t know if Ryan is a little bit older, but they’re more or less part of the same generation, wonderful actors,” Day-Lewis said.
The film that inspired a young Daniel Day-Lewis’ acting
Day-Lewis found inspiration as a young actor himself through the Martin Scorsese film Mean Streets. He was only 16 when he first saw the film, but had already developed an interest in acting after doing a play. Mean Streets opened Day-Lewis’ eyes to a different kind of theatrical experience.
“You could not imagine the effect that had on me. I was this young and slightly wayward guy from South London who just didn’t know what to do with his life. It was like a light going on in my head. It was so influential for me as a young person, never mind as a young actor. Then I saw that there could be a purpose for this acting, and that it wasn’t all about prancing around on stage in tights,” Day-Lewis once told Issu.
