Daniel Day-Lewis is making a return to acting, some seven years after what was billed as his final movie was released—and fans have a close family member of the three-time Oscar winner to thank.
The screen star had previously reunited with There Will Be Blood director Paul Thomas Anderson for the post-World War II period drama Phantom Thread, playing a lauded dressmaker whose meticulous creativity was severely tested when he fell in love with a young woman who challenged his structured life.
Ahead of the film's December 2017 release, fans were preparing to say goodbye to the London-born actor—at least when it came to new movies hitting the big screen—as he'd announced that he was bowing out of the profession for good.
However, it was this week reported that Day-Lewis, 67, would be returning in front of cameras to appear in Anemone, a film for which the actor's son, Ronan Day-Lewis, will be making his directorial debut. The father and son also cowrote the movie.
Currently in production, the film co-partnered by Focus Features and Plan B, has been described as "the intricate relationships between fathers, sons and brothers, and the dynamics of familial bonds."
The younger Day-Lewis' inaugural outing will not be short on star power: Game of Thrones alum Sean Bean and The Serpent Queen actress Samantha Morton are among the announced cast members.
Peter Kujawski, chair of Focus Features, has touted the upcoming movie as having "a truly exceptional script."
Newsweek has contacted a representative of Daniel Day-Lewis via email for comment.
The announcement comes after Daniel Day-Lewis shared that he had stepped away from his decades-long acting career after developing a "compulsion" to quit.
His publicist confirmed to Variety in June 2017: "Daniel Day-Lewis will no longer be working as an actor. He is immensely grateful to all of his collaborators and audiences over the many years. This is a private decision and neither he nor his representatives will make any further comment on this subject."
Speaking with W Magazine several months later for an article published in November 2017, the highly revered actor said: "I knew it was uncharacteristic to put out a statement. But I did want to draw a line. I didn't want to get sucked back into another project.
"All my life, I've mouthed off about how I should stop acting, and I don't know why it was different this time, but the impulse to quit took root in me, and that became a compulsion. It was something I had to do."
He added: "I've been interested in acting since I was 12 years old, and back then, everything other than the theater—that box of light—was cast in shadow. When I began, it was a question of salvation. Now, I want to explore the world in a different way."
Since then, Daniel Day-Lewis has rarely made public appearances. Perhaps as a prelude to his big return, the actor made a surprise appearance at January's National Board of Review Awards to present an award to director Martin Scorsese, with whom he has worked on movies The Age of Innocence and Gangs of New York.
Daniel Day-Lewis is the only actor in history to win three Academy Awards for outstanding lead actor. His first came for the 1989 drama My Left Foot, followed by a win for There Will Be Blood, released in 2007. He was awarded his most recent Oscar for 2012's Lincoln, the Steven Spielberg-directed biographical drama in which the actor portrayed President Abraham Lincoln. He was also nominated for Gangs of New York and In the Name of the Father.
The actor took a five-year break from acting in the late 1990s before returning to play gang leader William "Bill the Butcher" Cutting in Gangs of New York. During his hiatus, Daniel Day-Lewis spent 10 months working as an apprentice for shoemaker Stefano Bemer.
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