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I am supremely fed up with one of the silliest Oscar controversies ever. What an overblown, all-you-can-whine buffet for the bored.
That would be the extremely annoying uproar over “Marty Supreme” Best Actor nominee Timothée Chalamet’s recent dig at ballet and opera.
Social media dweebs are treating this guy like he’s Vladimir Putin. Worse, actually! What did Timmy say that has so inflamed the few, the loud, the obnoxious?
Timothée Chalame is under fire for saying “no one cares” about ballet and opera. CNN
During a conversation with classical music and dance connoisseur Matthew “You, Me and Dupree” McConaughey in February for CNN, Chalamet said that he admires the effort to keep movie theaters alive, because the ultimate key to that is delivering successful, popular films such as “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer.”
Indeed. But he wasn’t done.
“I don’t want to be working in ballet or opera where it’s, like, ‘Hey! Keep this thing alive,’ even though no one cares about this anymore,” Chalamet added, verbally tossing a match onto gasoline.
But, love opera and ballet or not, his broader point is hard to argue with. The vast majority do not care.
It’s as if Juan Soto said, “I don’t want to be a cricket player, because Americans are uninterested in cricket.” Well, yeah.
Whoopi Goldberg called Chalamet “vapid” and “shallow” on “The View.” ABC
Yet for expressing his risky opinion, Whoopi Goldberg and Sunny Hostin called Chalamet “vapid” and “shallow” on “The View,” a show about expressing risky opinions.
Holier-than-thou social media users that, I guarantee you, make no regular habit of going to the Met or New York City Ballet chimed in with typical screaming witlessness.
And on Wednesday, ballerina Misty Copeland, who helped promote “Marty Supreme,” grand plie’d on, though the dancer was more measured.
“I think that it’s important that we acknowledge that, yes, this is an art form that’s not ‘popular’ and a part of pop culture as movies are, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have enduring relevance in culture,” she said during a panel.
Ballerina Misty Copeland also shot back at the “Marty Supreme” star. Elliott Desai/Shutterstock
Well, that depends on how you define relevance.
Yes, most people can unknowingly hum melodies from old operas and ballets. The overture from Rossini’s “The Barber of Seville” shows up in the TV show “Curb Your Enthusiasm” a lot. Offenbach’s “Infernal Galop” is better known as the “Can Can.” The Americans who have seen a ballet probably went to “The Nutcracker” or “Swan Lake” — touchstones of global culture.
But what Chalamet means is he wants to be a part of new creations that are seen and discussed by as many people as possible. How dare he!
Yes, there are freshly written and choreographed operas and ballets. The Met put on “The Hours” and “The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay,” among many others in recent years. But these do not reverberate whatsoever outside the rarified worlds of opera and ballet. Plenty of people in this country can’t drive somewhere to see an old opera, let alone a new one.
True, the music is recorded and widely available, but opera will never — never — supply a “Hamilton.” C’est impossible.
That ballet is enriching to watch and learn and has continued to evolve stylistically does not mean that it’s expanding.
Chalamet was right to point out that ballet and opera are far less relevant than movies. AFP via Getty Images
In influence, these high arts are, in effect, frozen in time in a way that film, visual art, theater and many other creative pursuits, despite their own struggles, simply are not.
Think back to Miranda Priestly’s “Cerulean” speech in “The Devil Wears Prada” about how haute couture — expensive and out of reach for the average person — eventually trickles down into department store bargain bins. Paris fashion week has a ripple effect on what we wear.
The same is true of expensive Michelin-starred eateries. The restaurant Troisgros in France was among the first to not fully cook salmon in the West. Now, you can get it that way at Red Lobster.
Public art makes headlines and changes cities, good and bad. Look at the Vessel.
However, there is no comparable exchange with opera or ballet. You either enjoy going to them, or you do not.
And I do — opera in particular. It’s been part of my coverage at other newspapers. I’m partial to Massenet and Offenbach. But if you follow the news of national arts organizations, it ain’t on the rise.
The comments and remarks won’t affect Chalamet’s Oscar chances — they came too late. Getty Images for Critics Choice Association
Even Manhattan, which you’d think would have a bottomless supply of pinky-out audience members, is shrugging. The Met has such a giant cashflow problem that there have been dozens of layoffs. And general manager Peter Gelb has sought more than $100 million from Saudi Arabia and is looking to sell naming rights to the opera house. You know, the Raising Cane’s Theater.
In the wake of this nothingburger, desperate opera companies are actually seizing on Chalamet’s free p.r. by releasing statements inviting him to a performance or offering discount codes. Type “TIMOTHEE” on the Seattle Opera website and you can snag cheaper tickets to their production of “Carmen.”
Make no mistake — he’s helped them.
Opera and ballet companies are offering discount codes in the wake of the controversy.
Most irksome of all about this hullabaloo is I get the sense unoccupied losers are just trying to drum up an Oscars controversy. There’s no Karla Sofia Gascon racist tweets this go-around, and no “Green Book” for the elite to villainize. It’s all pretty dull and run of the mill, like John Kerry’s presidential campaign.
But Chalamet’s comments and the ensuing backlash will have no impact whatsoever on his Best Actor chances. Voting closed last Thursday, before the clip was widely circulated around the internet.
So whether opera and ballet are being hopelessly “kept alive” or not, I know what I want dead — this preposterous, unwinnable debate.