Timothée Chalamet charms cinema-goers but can't crack the Academy

Another awards season is over and Hollywood's hungriest actor, Timothée Chalamet, is going home Oscar-less once again after losing the hotly contested Best Leading Actor gong to Sinners star Michael B Jordan.

Chalamet is not quiet about his desire for an Academy Award.

At just 30 years old, Chalamet went into Oscars season with two Best Actor nominations, including one for his breakthrough role in 2017's Call Me By Your Name, which made him the third-youngest nominee in the category.

The shape of Chalamet's Marty Supreme campaign began at last year's SAG awards (renamed the Actor awards in 2026) where he won Best Lead Actor for his work in A Complete Unknown, finally trouncing frontrunner Adrien Brody, who had been pipping Chalamet at the post all season.

While accepting his SAG, Chalamet professed his desire to be "one of the greats".

"I know we're in a subjective business, but the truth is, I'm really in pursuit of greatness," he said.

At the time, it was received by the public fairly well, even as refreshing; a young actor who had just spent years on a role backing his own product.

But what was perceived as plucky in 2025, soured into contempt as Chalamet made another full-throated push for Oscar's glory with Marty Supreme.

Hypebeast behaviour

Chalamet is no stranger to a PR stunt. He copped a fine last year after he rode a Lime bike into the A Complete Unknown London premiere.

But for Marty Supreme, Chalamet went on a full-force PR stunt blitz, folding in several culture-chokehold stunts which started in October 2025, three months before the film's release date.

It began with wordless live-streams featuring Chalamet flanked by security in giant orange ping pong balls (DP'd by Aussie Dune cinematographer Greig Fraser, naturally).

A week later, Marty Supreme studio A24 posted an 18-minute "leaked" PR brainstorming meeting, featuring a chrome-domed Chalamet throwing out increasingly wacky ideas (including painting the statue of liberty Marty Supreme's trademark orange).

While the statue stayed green, Chalamet's promo campaign pushed on with bright orange blimps containing Variety reporters, an advertising campaign made up of GOATs (greatest of all times) from Tom Brady to Bill Nye to Frank Ocean to his partner Kylie Jenner sporting the Marty Supreme wind-breaker (which was quickly christened the "defining garment" of 2025) and Chalamet himself standing on top of the Las Vegas Sphere, which had been drenched in orange.

At the Los Angeles premiere of Marty Supreme, Chalamet and Jenner turned heads in lurid orange outfits which he described as going "full Marty" in a look that made such an impact it was parodied by comedians Meg Stalter and Paul W Downs not a month later at the Critics' Choice Awards.

Five days before the film's US release, Chalamet leant into the viral rumour (which the actor encouraged) that he was rapper EsDeeKid by releasing a song with the British musician.

All up, A24 dropped a reported $US70 million on production before marketing, the most the independent studio has ever spent on one film.

But Chalamet's peacocking paid off: Marty Supreme opened to a $US27 million opening weekend — an incredible showing for an R-rated sports drama with no major studio backing.

By early February, Marty Supreme had become A24's highest grossing film taking in $US147 million worldwide and stealing the record from Best Picture 2022 winner Everything Everywhere All At Once.

Marty Supreme was universally praised on release, with many critics saving their most glittering compliments for Chalamet's performance as Marty Mauser.

By the end of January, and with a Golden Globe and a Critics' Choice under his belt, Chalamet's Gold Derby odds of winning the Best Actor Oscar peaked at a whopping 86 per cent.

Trending downwards

Back in November 2025, the first hint of Chalamet's Marty Supreme aura backfiring on him emerged in the form of an interview. The young actor compelled the audience to not take his "top-level work" for granted.

"This is probably my best performance, you know, and it's been like seven, eight years that I've been handing in really, really committed top-of-the-line performances," Chalamet said in a now-deleted YouTube video.

"It's important to say it out loud because of the discipline and the work ethic I'm bringing to these things."

Comments ranged from punters saying "He's too young to be that cocky" to assertions he was going "Kanye" to claims he was still in the Mauser character.

Things started to look shaky for Chalamet on the awards circuit going into February, after an unverified report of toxic workplaces on Josh Safdie, Marty Supreme's director, emerged.

Another blow came when, despite being pipped to win, Chalamet lost the BAFTA to Robert Aramayo. Suddenly, his campaign didn't seem so bulletproof.

Then March rolled around, and Michael B Jordan struck the first nail in Chalamet's coffin by winning the Actor (formally SAG) award, a major predictor for the Oscars win. The Sinners star surged ahead in polls but Chalamet still kept a comfortable lead.

Chalamet vs the Ballet

After already losing footing to Jordan, Chalamet may have torpedoed his last shot with a couple of unfortunately phrased pull-quotes.

In late February, Chalamet participated in a Variety town hall with Matthew McConaughey when the conversation turned to the current waning popularity of cinema.

"I admire people, and I've done it myself, who go on a talk show and go, 'Hey, we gotta keep movie theatres alive. You know, we gotta keep this genre alive'," he said.

But as the topic switched to other art forms, Chalamet uttered the words that may have ended his Oscar dreams:

"All respect to the ballet and opera people out there. I just lost 14 cents in viewership. I just took shots for no reason."

Everybody from Whoopi Goldberg to Doja Cat to the principal of his former high school condemned Chalamet's flippant comments. Opera and ballet companies from around the world used the opportunity to promote their current tours, with the Seattle Opera even offering a 14 per cent discount to their production of Carmen using the code Timothee.

Lucky for Chalamet, these resurfaced comments made a splash just a day before Oscar voting closed.

As the last ballots were collected, Chalamet still had a slight lead on Jordan. But as the backlash swelled, his lead shrank and the internet hordes, who up until now had been the actor's greatest champion, turned on him with memes and think pieces.

By the morning of the 98th Academy Awards, Chalamet was trailing Jordan 63 per cent to 25 per cent and yet the Oscars room still exploded with cheers when Jordan's name was read out.

Timothée Chalamet's Marty Supreme dreams proved too big. See you back here next year for Dune: Part Three.