UPDATED 3/10 7:40 a.m. ET: Doja Cat has provided more context on her decision to speak out about Timothée Chalamet’s over-discussed remarks on ballet and opera, telling fans she was, in her words, “virtue-signaling” in an attempt to connect.
“I’ve never been to a ballet, I’ve never seen an opera, and I took it upon myself yesterday to kind of give it to the man,” Doja said in a video shared to social media on Monday (March 9). “Because there is a culture based around outrage and things like that and people wanna feel like they’re part of something. It’s like a need to connect, whether good or bad.”
While Chalamet’s remarks in question were “poorly put,” Doja said while citing a TikTok video she watched in which the much-debated moment was broken down through a historical lens, they were also ultimately accurate.
“But what I was doing yesterday was virtue-signaling because I wanted to connect and I knew that Timothée’s goof-up was something that I could leverage in order for people to connect with me and fuck with me,” Doja added. “It’s easy. It’s a modern way to garner clicks, likes, approval, and all kinds of things like that from people. And so, I did that yesterday.”
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Doja Cat wants fans to know how “fucking beautiful” ballet and opera are following some remarks on the longstanding art forms by Oscar-nominated Marty Supreme star Timothée Chalamet.
In a video shared to social media over the weekend, but seemingly since removed, the Vie artist noted the hundreds of years of history behind both, then intentionally mispronounced Chalamet’s name as an introduction to her larger point.
“By the way, opera is 400 years old. Ballet is 500 years old,” Doja said in the clip, seen below. “Somebody named Timothée Chalamet had the nerve—big guy, by the way—to say on camera that nobody cares about it. I'm sure you can walk into an opera theater right now, [and] seats will be filled and nobody's saying a word as the performance is going because everybody has that much respect for it. There is an etiquette around opera. There is etiquette around ballet. It's amazing. It's an amazing theater medium. It's fucking beautiful.”
Doja continued by highlighting the work such performers put into their craft, all while operating from a place of respect for the form’s history.
“They show up and they break and they bleed every single day, just because they have respect for it. They love it,” she said. “They love what they do. It doesn't matter if the industry is having a tough time at any time, which a lot of industries have a tough time. Your industry has a tough time. My industry has a tough time. 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. People give a fuck.”
In the clip’s final seconds, Doja indirectly offered some advice for Chalamet, who’s up for Best Actor in a Leading Role at this Sunday’s Oscars ceremony.
“You show up in a nice outfit, you sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up,” she said. “That's the usual etiquette around those things. Maybe learn something from that.”
To be fair, Chalamet’s original comments, delivered during a Variety and CNN town hall event with Matthew McConaughey, were more nuanced than might be assumed when viewed in their full context. It’s also worth noting that Chalamet, whose mother and sister are both alums of the School of American Ballet, appeared to immediately regret his remarks, perhaps sensing the pushback they could bring despite the more nuanced point being made.
After he and McConaughey traded thoughts on how limited attention spans might be affecting what certain studios want to see in terms of story formatting, Chalamet continued on the topic by first noting the differing theatrical habits between specific generations, ultimately making his way to a self-assessment on where he sees himself fitting into all of this. Per Chalamet, he’s “right in the middle of” these issues at this stage in his career.
Chalamet then highlighted his admiration for actors who, like himself, have made a point to champion the theatrical experience and/or passionately encourage viewers to support specific genres as part of a larger effort to ensure their future vitality. This led to the ballet and opera mentions you’ve no doubt read quite a lot about in recent days.
“I don’t wanna be working in ballet or opera or, you know, things where it’s like ‘Hey, keep this thing alive’ even though it’s like no one cares about this anymore,” the three-time Oscar nominee said. “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.”
Final Oscars voting ended on March 5, with winners set to be unveiled this weekend. Joining Chalamet as fellow Best Actor nominees are Leonardo DiCaprio (One Battle After Another), Ethan Hawke (Blue Moon), Michael B. Jordan (Sinners), and Wagner Moura (The Secret Agent). The 30-year-old previously earned nominations in this category for Call Me By Your Name and A Complete Unknown.