Brian Cox is calling out the very American way of Method acting.
The Scottish star of “Succession” addressed co-star Jeremy Strong’s approach to his character Kendall Roy in the hit HBO series, which is concluding after its upcoming fourth and final season.
“I’m glad he is not in pain personally,” Cox told Variety, calling Strong “a wonderful actor.” Yet the Method acting debate is rooted in what Strong represents, according to Cox.
“It’s really a cultural clash,” he said. “I don’t put up with all that American shit. I’m sorry. All that sort of ‘I think, therefore I feel.’ Just do the job. Don’t ‘identify.’”
Cox pointed to Strong’s former boss and mentor Daniel Day-Lewis, with whom Cox co-starred with on 1997’s “The Boxer.”
“He retired at the age of 55, and I’m going, ‘That’s when the roles become really interesting. You’ve retired just at the point when actually the roles get better!’” Cox said. “Of course, Jeremy was Dan Day-Lewis’ assistant. So he’s learned all that stuff from Dan.”
Day-Lewis is from London, to note, while Strong is from Boston.
As for “Succession” wrapping up, Cox admitted, “I’ll miss the cast, I’ll miss the atmosphere, I’ll miss the bonhomie. [My character] Logan, probably, I’ll miss a bit. But upward and onwards.”
Cox previously said that Strong’s Method acting was “fucking annoying” and encouraged his co-star to relax.
“He’s a very good actor, and the rest of the ensemble is all OK with this. But knowing a character and what the character does is only part of the skill set,” Cox said. “He’s still that guy, because he feels if he went somewhere else he’d lose it. But he won’t! Strong is talented. He’s fucking gifted. When you’ve got the gift, celebrate the gift. Go back to your trailer and have a hit of marijuana, you know?”
Strong himself recently addressed the ongoing debate over his acting process in a GQ cover story.
“Everyone’s entitled to have their feelings,” Strong said. “I also think Brian Cox, for example, he’s earned the right to say whatever the fuck he wants. There was no need to address that or do damage control. I feel a lot of love for my siblings and my father on the show. And it is like a family in the sense that, and I’m sure they would say this, too, you don’t always like the people that you love. I do always respect them.”
He added, “I saw that Brian Cox also said, in a follow-up interview, that ‘there is a certain amount of pain at the root of Jeremy, and I just feel for that pain.’ You know, I don’t think so. I don’t think there is. There’s certainly a lot of pain in Kendall, and I haven’t really met Brian outside of the confines of that.”
For all the details on “Succession” Season 4, click here.
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