Timothée Chalamet has been catching some flak over the past few days for comments he made about opera and ballet. Last month he reunited with his Interstellar dad Matthew McConaughey for a Variety/CNN town hall, during which they debated how short-form video content and waning audience attention spans play into box office turnouts and the pacing of popular screenplays: “I admire people, and I’ve done it myself, who go on a talk show and say, ‘Hey, we’ve got to keep movie theaters alive, we’ve gotta keep this genre alive,'” Timmy Tim said. “And another part of me feels like if people want to see it, like Barbie, like Oppenheimer, they’re going to go see it and go out of their way to be loud and proud about it.”
That’s fine, but a lot of people have been upset about what Chalamet said next: “I don’t want to be working in ballet, or opera, or things where it’s like, ‘Hey, keep this thing alive, even though like no one cares about this anymore. All respect to the ballet and opera people out there. I just lost 14 cents in viewership. Damn, I just took shots for no reason.” After the clip went viral, those ballet and opera people are sharing their two cents.
In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, the UK’s Royal Ballet And Opera said: “Ballet and opera have never existed in isolation — they have continually informed, inspired, and elevated other art forms. Their influence can be felt across theatre, film, contemporary music, fashion, and beyond. For centuries, these disciplines have shaped the way artists create and audiences experience culture, and today millions of people around the world continue to enjoy and engage with them.”
Individuals in the industry are chiming in, too. American opera singer Isabel Leonard wrote in a comment: “Honestly, I’m shocked that someone so seemingly successful can be so ineloquent and narrow-minded in his views about art while considering himself as [an] artist as I would only imagine one would as an actor… To take cheap shots at fellow artists says more in this interview than anything else he could say. Shows a lot about his character. 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.”
Canadian opera singer Deepa Johnny called Chalamet’s remarks a “disappointing take,” adding: “There is nothing more impressive than the magic of live theatre, ballet and opera. We should be trying to uplift these art forms, these artists and come together across disciplines to do that.”
Irish opera singer Seán Tester wrote on his Instagram: “[This] is the kind of reductive take you hear when popularity is mistaken for cultural value… Opera and ballet have survived wars, revolutions, censorship, and centuries of cultural upheaval — not because they are relics, but because they are among the most physically and emotionally demanding art forms humanity has ever created… To call these art forms irrelevant says far less about the art itself than it does about how little time someone has spent truly experiencing it.”
On top of that, the English National Opera, the Royal Ballet And Opera, the Seattle Opera, and New York’s own Met Opera have all shared posts of their own imploring Chalamet to visit. Chalamet has voiced his distaste in opera and ballet multiple times in the past, though, so I doubt he’s interested in changing his tune on the subject (although he has been spotted at least once in a New York City Ballet hat).
Luckily for Chalamet, these most recent comments went viral after Oscar voting ended, so they won’t hurt his Best Actor chances. It’s a tight race between the Marty Supreme star and Sinners star Michael B. Jordan, whose thoughts on opera and ballet are unclear.
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