Women have always ‘method acted’ – they just don’t get called geniuses for it

In a recent interview with the Hollywood Reporter, actor Anya Taylor-Joy offered an explanation for why so few women are “method actors”: women, in her words, “can’t completely lose our minds”. Natalie Portman has said method acting is a “luxury women can’t afford”. Kristen Stewart made the same argument. Method acting, as it is popularly understood, is not a stable, agreed-upon category. It is a retrospective label stitched together from a handful of anecdotes – Daniel Day-Lewis having crew…