9 Completely Pointless Preparations By Method Actors

5. Daniel Day-Lewis Learned Czech For The English-Language The Unbearable Lightness Of Being

Daniel Day-Lewis is no stranger to extreme role preparation, what with him being the biggest method-lover in the land. What's harder to understand is how exactly Day-Lewis would have benefitted from his particular preparation for Phillip Kaufman's The Unbearable Lightness Of Being, a Cold War drama set in Prague concerning Day-Lewis's randy Czech doctor, Tomas. Obviously, Day-Lewis decided it would be a good idea to learn the Czech language for the film - so far, so DDL, and of course it's not the first time an English-speaking actor has learned another language just for a part (see De Niro nailing the Sicilian in The Godfather Part II, and Tilda Swinton taking on both Russian and Italian for I Am Love). The issue in Day-Lewis's case is he doesn't speak a word of Czech in The Unbearable Lightness Of Being - rather, he goes for English in a light Czech accent, just like everybody else in the film. Still, learning a language pointlessly is one of the less extreme things Day-Lewis has done; at least he didn't go feral and live in the woods again (see: The Last Of The Mohicans).