Jeremy Strong Doesn't Feel He Needs to Apologize for His Method: "A Lot of the Reactions to It Are of a Personal Nature"

Jeremy Strong isn't backing down from method acting. Four days before Aaron Sorkin's "The Social Reckoning" hits theaters, he sat down with David Remnick on The New Yorker and got asked whether his much-talked-about method approach is bad for a set:

I think I can't really speak to that. Of course, it is never my intention to interfere with anyone else's experience or anyone else's way of working. First, do no harm, right? But commit to fucking what you're doing, and utterly.

Remnick pushed him on whether he gets frustrated with colleagues who don't go as far, and Strong said that's not really the point, he's just there "to commit utterly to serving the material." Then he said the thing everyone's going to be quoting this week:

So, if some people feel that I'm taking it too seriously, or it changes the molecules in the room in a way that makes something uncomfortable, I guess that's something that I don't feel that I need to apologize for, because I believe, and I think the directors that I work with all believe, that it's in service of the material, and I personally think that a lot of the reactions to it are of a personal nature.

"Of a personal nature." In other words, if you've got a problem with how he works, that's on you.

A few weeks ago I wrote about Sorkin telling The New York Times that Strong treated his co-stars the way he figured Zuckerberg would have. Those co-stars? Jeremy Allen White, Mikey Madison, Bill Burr, Betty Gilpin and Billy Magnussen. Like I said then, there's been a lot of pushback lately against what's mostly a guy thing, and a lot of it's come from women. Anya Taylor-Joy, Toni Collette and Kristen Stewart have all brushed it off one way or another.

Strong's reputation precedes him. He once asked to be hit with real tear gas on "The Trial of the Chicago 7." Sorkin said no. Brian Cox has called his process "fucking annoying" more than once, while also admitting Strong "was wonderful to act with."

However, here's the thing, the results keep proving him right. He's great in pretty much everything. Daniel Day-Lewis, his mentor, worked this way for decades. Same with Robert De Niro. The real question is whether "commitment" has to come at everyone else's expense. Strong's answer is basically yes, and he's fine with that.