Timothée Chalamet has learned a tough lesson in recent days – if you dis other artforms, they will come for you.
The Hollywood star, considered a frontrunner for this year’s best actor Oscar for his performance in Marty Supreme, has sparked a vicious backlash after his comments about ballet and opera went viral.
Chalamet made the faux pas (de deux) while discussing the declining popularity of movie theatres in a town-hall-style conversation in Austin, Texas, with fellow actor Matthew McConaughey.
“I don’t want to be working in ballet or opera, or you know, things where it’s like, ‘Hey, keep this thing alive’, even though it’s like, no one cares about this anymore,” the actor said at the Variety and CNN event.
Laughing, Chalamet quickly added: “All respect to the ballet and opera people out there. I just lost 14 cents in viewership. I just took shots for no reason.”
It turns out people do care – a lot.
Everyone from top-tier opera and ballet companies to Broadway stars and fellow Hollywood heavyweights has weighed in on the ensuing controversy, with many media outlets pointing out that Chalamet should know better since his mother, sister and grandmother all danced with the New York City Ballet.
“He’s gonna be singing a different tune when the live arts are all that’s left after AI takes over. Oh wait. He’s above singing a tune,” wrote actor and Tony-winning Broadway performer Laura Benanti on an Instagram clip by the New York-based Met Opera, which has amassed more than 6600 comments hating on Chalamet.
Source: Megan Fairchild / Instagram
Megan Fairchild, a principle dancer at New York City Ballet, also vented her anger in an Instagram post that has had more than 340,000 views.
“Honestly, it’s not even the idea that he dissed ballet and opera that bothers me – it’s the suggestion that he had the talent and aptitude to pursue these Olympic-level artistic fields in the first place,” she wrote.
Britain’s Royal Ballet and Opera tagged Chalamet in an Instagram video post noting that “thousands of people” gather to watch ballet and opera every night at London’s Royal Opera House, while Broadway artist Zach McNally slammed him for “taking shots at opera and ballet”.
“Why are any artists taking shots at any other artist in the time where artificial intelligence threatens literally all art forms – except performing art like plays, ballets and operas and musicals?” McNally said.
His post has since been shared in an Instagram story by Freaky Friday star Jamie-Lee Curtis, while other screen actors including Helen Hunt, Eva Mendes and Modern Family’s Sarah Hyland have also either commented or liked posts calling out Chalamet.
“Kid single-handedly boosted Opera & ballet! Well done Timmy,” quipped actor and comedian Jeremy Piven.
The 30-year-old star of Dune and Wonka has been in the spotlight almost constantly during his award-season campaign for the sports drama-comedy Marty Supreme, in which he plays an ambitious and obsessive 1950s table tennis player named Marty Mauser.
Chalamet, who has previously been nominated for a best-actor Oscar for A Complete Unknown (2025) and Call Me By Your Name (2018), has already taken home the acting gong at the Critics Choice Awards and Golden Globes for Marty Supreme. He is considered to be in a two-way-race with Sinners’ star Michael B Jordan for the Academy Award. The film, which he co-produced, is also vying for best picture.
The ballet and opera backlash isn’t expected to affect Chalamet’s chances of taking home the best actor Oscar because even though the comments were made late last month, they weren’t widely publicised until after voting closed on March 5.
But even before then, some award watchers were already suggesting the actor’s “swagger” and unconventional promotional tactics in the lead-up to the 98th Academy Awards on March 15 (US time) could work against him.
These include hosting a fake Zoom marketing meeting for Marty Supreme, collaborating with rapper EsDeeKid, and standing on Las Vegas’s Sphere entertainment area to promote the film.
As The Hollywood Reporter commented: “Chalamet does things his own way.”
The conversation with McConaughey, his co-star in the 2014 sci-fi film Interstellar, is one example of how the young actor does – and says – things his own way, but in this instance it backfired badly.
Joining the pile-on this week, panellists on US chat show The View agreed the actor’s comments about ballet and opera were disappointing and offensive.
“I didn’t realise that he was that vapid and that shallow,” said panellist Sunny Hostin, a member of the Dance Theatre of Harlem, a professional ballet company and school.
“When you crap on somebody else’s art form, it doesn’t feel good,” concurred host Whoopi Goldberg, adding that Chalamet had compounded the insult with his joking apology about “respect” and what it would cost him in lost viewership.
“When people get mad, it’ll be a lot more than 14 cents… so be careful, boy,” Goldberg warned.
Some, however, have pointed out that the viral backlash over Chalamet’s arts slight shows the extent to which Hollywood really does dominate other entertainment forms. The LA Times reported on Tuesday that the conversation had now reached more than 8.35 million people worldwide.
Perhaps the most clever response amid all the brouhaha has came from the Seattle Opera, which used the furore to promote its production of Carmen, offering a 14 per cent discount to ticket buyers who used the promo code “TIMOTHEE”.
“Timmy, you’re welcome to use it too 💃 See you at the opera!” it added in the caption.
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