10 Actors Who Took A Ridiculously Long Time To Prepare For Iconic Roles

4. Daniel Day-Lewis (Again) - The Boxer

Time Spent Preparing: 18 months Again Daniel Day-Lewis enters the picture, for an acclaimed, Golden Globe-nominated performance. By 1997, Day-Lewis' commitment had already become mythical in the industry, but he was about to put an end to a relatively prolific streak in the '80s and early '90s by becoming the more selective actor everyone knows today. It was at the end of this period, on one of his less-celebrated films, that Day-Lewis took the most time he would take to prepare for a role. For The Boxer, which reunited Day-Lewis with My Left Foot and In The Name Of The Father director Jim Sheridan, Day-Lewis trained under former world featherweight champion Barry McGuigan for 18 months, with the actor working out twice a day, every day in that time, in order to give him a boxer's physique. In the end, McGuigan said Day-Lewis could have turned pro.