Timothée Chalamet has been up for the Academy Award for Best Actor three times, narrowly missing the win in 2018 and 2025. After a critically acclaimed performance in ping-pong epic Marty Supreme, the odds were finally in Chalamet’s favor heading into the ceremony this Sunday, March 15—until he learned the hard way that ballet and opera fans are not to be trifled with.
At a town hall hosted by CNN and Variety on February 24, Chalamet shared his hot take on why he prefers working in film to other creative industries.
“I don’t want to be working in ballet, or opera, or things where it’s like, ‘Hey, keep this thing alive, even though it’s like no one cares about this anymore,’” he said. “All respect to all the ballet and opera people out there.”
After realizing his comment was a bit harsh, he added with a laugh, “I just lost 14 cents in viewership. I just took shots for no reason.” Chalamet capped off the moment by singing a note heavy with vibrato, seemingly his impression of an opera singer.
The internet quickly proved that people do, in fact, still care about ballet and opera. When the clip resurfaced this week ahead of the Oscars, social media users tore Chalamet’s argument to shreds. That includes the artists working in those industries, like opera singer Isabel Leonard, who left a scathing comment on a video about Chalamet’s remarks.
“To take cheap shots at fellow artists says more in this interview than anything else he could say. Shows a lot about his character,” Leonard wrote. “You don’t have to like all art but only a weak person/artist feels the need to diminish in fact the VERY arts that would inspire those who are interested in slowing down, to do exactly that.”
Celebrities from other fields have also chimed in, including rapper Doja Cat. “It doesn’t matter if the industry is having a tough time at any time,” she said in a since-deleted video she posted to TikTok. “Doesn’t mean people don’t care about it. People care. The dancers care, the singers care, the audience cares. There’s still an audience.”
And on this week’s episode of Saturday Night Live, comedian Colin Jost poked fun at the controversy with a joke during the show’s “Weekend Update” segment. “Timothée Chalamet is being criticized by major opera and ballet organizations after he said that no one cares about those art forms,” Jost said. “Chalamet made the comment on a press tour for his movie about ping-pong.”
Meanwhile, the opera and ballet industries that Chalamet criticized are getting some of their best press in years. Several opera houses and ballet companies have posted in response to Chalamet, including the Metropolitan Opera, which took the chance to highlight its artistry with a behind-the-scenes montage captioned, “This one’s for you, Timothée Chalamet.”
Seattle Opera turned the discourse into a promotion, riffing on Chalamet’s claim that he lost “14 cents in viewership” by offering audiences 14% off tickets to its current production of Carmen.
And even within the world of film, organizations like the National Board of Review are highlighting the value of ballet and opera. NBR posted a compilation of iconic movie scenes featuring song and dance, captioning it, “The National Board of Review is proud to celebrate cinema—and all other art forms.”
Could all of this amount to an upset against Chalamet at the Oscars? As of Saturday, March 7, prediction markets like Kalshi now show Chalamet losing the Best Actor award for the first time in months, instead predicting that Michael B. Jordan will take home the prize for his dual performance in Sinners.
Kalshi currently gives Chalamet just a 43.6% chance of winning the Oscar, a far cry from his peak odds of 78.8% just weeks ago on February 14.
However, voting for the Oscars closed on Thursday, March 5, so the backlash to Chalamet’s comments may not have gained traction early enough to cost him a win.
Regardless, he inadvertently gave the art forms he criticized a big boost in online attention, proving his original statement patently false: Ballet and opera remain very much alive.