Timothée Chalamet, THE Celebrity of these Times, promotes Marty Supreme in Vogue

It made headlines during the Screen Actors Guild awards earlier this year and it’s mentioned in his new American Vogue cover story this year – what Timothée Chalamet said when he won: that he was “in pursuit of greatness”, that he was chasing Viola Davis, Daniel Day-Lewis, Marlon Brando, as a performing artist. And then, of course, came the debate that followed. Was it too much ego? Or was it a refreshing declaration of ambition from a young actor, considered by many (including me) to be the finest of his generation? 

I wasn’t mad at it, I actually loved it. Do I think a woman could have gotten up there and done the same thing? F-ck no. But that’s not his fault, and I’d rather see Timmy up there articulating what everyone in that room, every actor in the industry, secretly wants for themselves than pretending the thirst isn’t there. 

That was eight months ago, as Timmy was campaigning during the last award season for his work in A Complete Unknown as Bob Dylan. Cut to now, Timothée is promoting Marty Supreme, a character who is actually all ego, a famewhore, the most vain and self-absorbed and compromised but uncompromising figure that Timmy has ever played. Marty will stop at nothing to be a legend. So, looking back at Timmy’s “in pursuit of greatness”, it may have been a teaser for what we’re seeing now on this press tour, an early glimpse as he transitioned from his time in the skin of an actual legend to a wannabe one. 

This is why Timothée Chalamet is THE Celebrity of these Times. He is as creative with his fame as he is with his characters. And right now, in this moment, for this film, he’s not running from the want, the hunger, the trying. Does he crave the Oscar? F-ck yes. And he says as much to Vogue. 

“If there’s five people at an awards show, and four people go home losing,” Chalamet says, “you don’t think those four people are at the restaurant like, ‘Damn, we didn’t win’? I’ve been around some deeply generous, no-ego actors, and maybe some of them are going, ‘That was fun.’ But I know for a fact a lot of them are going, ‘F-ck!’” At least Chalamet is honest about it. “People can call me a try-hard, and they can say whatever the f-ck,” he continues. “But I’m the one actually doing it here.”

In an age when fewer and fewer movie stars are created, Timothée is indeed one of the last movie stars, at least for now. And he clearly craves validation. After all, the movie business was built on validation from both within and outside of the industry. You need the people in Hollywood to buy into your star quality. You need the audience to feed on that star quality. Validation for celebrities is nutrition. As Timmy says, there’s no point in denying it. 

Nor is there any point in trying to look like you don’t give a sh-t whether or not people see your movies when you’re a movie star. Which is why he’s so involved in the Marty Supreme promotional push, as the lead actor but also a producer. He’s designing the merch, he’s coming up with the stunts (the orange ping-pong entourage that’s been following him around), whatever he’ll be wearing on the red carpets, and most importantly, how he will performing in all his interviews – a hybrid of himself, an actual celebrity, and Marty, a semi-fictional desperado celebrity. 

And if people want to say that he’s doing too much, well, I mean, this is a theatre kid from New York, it’s in his goddamn DNA to do too much, do we actually want Timothée Chalamet to move around the world like he’s Leonardo DiCaprio? I don’t. 

Let him have his ambition while he puts the effort, in front of the camera and when the camera isn’t rolling. Celebrity gossip is so much more fun when our movie stars openly want to be movie stars. And by the way, LOL at his response when he is asked, as a movie star, whether or not he would ever do television. Duana’s not going to like this, probably, but the answer is a firm “no”.