bitchy | Timothee Chalamet: ‘No one cares’ about ballet or opera anymore

I was 100% thrilled for Michael B. Jordan when he won the SAG/Actor Award for Sinners on Sunday. Just pure hype and energy and happiness for MBJ. But about 10% of that happiness was because Timothee Chalamet didn’t win. Ever since I saw Marty Supreme, I’ve been on the hate train. To be clear, I don’t hate Chalamet whatsoever. He’s a wonderful actor and his time will come. But I really, really do not want him to win the Oscar for that film and that performance.

Ever since MBJ’s SAG win, there’s been a lot of talk about Timothee’s campaign and where he messed up and what can be learned. I’m going to make a bold statement – I actually don’t think his campaign was the biggest problem, it was the actual performance and the film itself. My guess is that the film was disliked, and then Timothee’s too-much/too-everywhere campaign turned people off as an added bonus. Of course, this conversation will be null and void if Timothee ends up with the Oscar. I just think Academy voters were already looking for a reason to vote for anyone else, and that’s why Wagner Moura and MBJ are now being considered as the top choices in Best Actor.

As for Timothee’s super-extra campaign, CNN and Variety did a “live townhall” discussion with Timothee and Matthew McConaughey last week. I actually think it’s nice that CNN is doing more to support the arts, but this was and is completely unnecessary. You can see the full YouTube video here. As part of a larger conversation about movie theaters and making movies which people want to see, Timothee declared, “I don’t want to be working in ballet or opera where it’s like, ‘Hey, keep this thing alive, even though no one cares about this anymore.’ All respect to the ballet and opera people out there. I just lost 14 cents in viewership.” Now he’s made enemies of opera people and ballet people on top of everything else! (For what it’s worth, ballet still seems very popular? The NYC Ballet galas are always well-attended by A-listers, so I have no idea what he’s talking about.)

Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.