As I watched a clip of Timothée Chalamet ‘cranking dat’ to Soulja Boy onstage at an event in Brazil – a nod to a fan favourite video of him doing the same as a preteen that periodically circulates online – I realised we might be seeing the dawn of a new Hollywood promotional playbook.
Because rather than simply sticking to the standard formula of press junkets and tasteful magazine profiles accompanied by gauzy fashion photography – the sort of fare one usually expects of a Serious Actor on the promo trail – Chalamet has instead opted for a series of quirkily unexpected stunts to promote his forthcoming movie Marty Supreme.
Whether turning up to the film’s premiere with girlfriend Kylie Jenner in delightfully tacky matching outfits or releasing a video in which he is pelted by thousands of orange ping pong balls, Chalamet is the rare Hollywood star who doesn’t appear to take himself too seriously. In some ways his unconventional approach to stardom is fairly retro, reminiscent of 1990s and 2000s celebrity culture, when stars on the promo trail would allow themselves to be gunged at the Nickelodeon Kids Choice Awards or, as Justin and Britney famously did, turn up to awards shows in matching denim outfits. Given how many Hollywood stars tend towards brooding self-seriousness, even though a large part of their job involves walking red carpets (and being paid a lot of money to do so), it’s refreshing to encounter one who realises that a key part of the job description when working in entertainment is to do exactly that – to entertain.
Though perhaps it’s inaccurate to say that Chalamet doesn’t take himself too seriously – accepting a Screen Actors’ Guild award earlier this year for his portrayal of Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown, he delivered a touchingly earnest speech in which he professed to be “in pursuit of greatness”. A correction, then: he is serious about his acting, but little else.
It’s clear too, that Chalamet has an instinctive understanding of the attention economy and how to generate buzz online. When he turned up to a lookalike competition staged by fans in a New York park last year, it was the work of a celebrity who is in on the joke, and his appearance became a viral news story so potent it was even covered by the BBC. His Marty Supreme promotional stunts are also refreshingly original, a progression from the increasingly rote appearances on YouTube shows like Hot Ones or Chicken Shop Date celebrities now gravitate towards (which for all their irreverence, audiences have come to recognise are as carefully stage managed as traditional media interviews).
Of course it helps that Chalamet is undeniably charismatic, as comfortable posing for pictures with fans in a crowded New York park as he is in the somewhat anarchic environs of Graham Norton’s sofa (a setting in which many other Hollywood types have fallen short, wrongfooted by a bawdy Miriam Margolyes quip). You can’t really teach that – though I imagine many Hollywood publicists are about to start trying.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source graziadaily.co.uk ’
