method actor

noun

variants or less commonly Method actor

plural method actors also Method actors

: an actor who seeks to gain complete identification with the inner personality of the character being portrayed : an actor who uses the Method technique (see method sense 4)

As a method actor, she internalizes the problems and attitudes of her role, and hangs on to them with a terrier's tenaciousness, making them her own for as long as she needs them.

—Michael Ryan

In that vein, it was amusing to watch an accomplished actor … when he plaintively asked (this was in the script) the oldest Method actor's refrain in the book: "I mean, what's my motivation here?"

—Don Aucoin

Word History

First Known Use

1955, in the meaning defined above