The Problem With Timothee Chalamet's SAG Speech
A few weeks ago during his acceptance speech for the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role for his role as Bob Dylan in A Complete Unknown, Timothee Chalamet made a bold statement saying, “I know the classiest thing would be to downplay the effort that went into this role and how much this means to me, but the truth is this was five years of my life.” and, “I can’t downplay the significance of this award because it means the most to me. I know we’re in a subjective business, but the truth is, I’m really in pursuit of greatness. I know people don’t usually talk like that, but I want to be one of the greats.”
My interpretation of this portion of his speech is that Bob Dylan meant a lot to him and he devoted a large fraction of his entire life to bring this role to life. I also think that he really wanted to win some type of big award for this role specifically. I'm not a movie girlie but others have been saying that this role is Oscar bait, so in my mind I’m assuming that he thinks that this will get him the level of accolades and reward that he has been looking for. I also think that he considers himself a great actor or at the very least that he thinks he can become one of the greats one day.
He then goes on to shout out a few legends across basketball, directing, and acting including Viola Davis. The internet went crazy of course, he’s coming off the back of a successful press run where he has been relatable (e.g., hosting and performing on SNL, giving his college football gameday predictions, many podcast appearances) so there were lots of TikTok videos coming out in support of him pushing the sentiment that it’s okay to not be humble and you can talk your shit, blah blah blah. But I think there were a few crucial points that we are missing.
The first is as a society we have an obsession with accomplishing these great things when you are young as if these accolades will only matter then. Timothee Chalamet will have a long career ahead of him but to me this speech feels like he is trying to rush the process and wants all the accolades and recognition now. I don’t fully put this on him, I also put this on the rest of us because we’re essentially not allowing him the opportunity to grow or to truly develop his craft to reach new heights. We’re earmarking him as a “great actor” not at such a young age before he’s had the opportunity to improve and really hit his strides in his career. My favorite example that I love to use is Beyonce. During her set at Coachella she performed music from earlier in her career, if you compare her vocal prowess and musicality from the performance to the original tracks released any average person would notice a stark difference. That is the result of a decades long pursuit of greatness. Let artists grow, develop, and become a better version of themselves instead of forcing them to reach these heights at such a young age. Talent takes time to mature and transform into something we didn’t think was possible, let’s give it the space to do so.
The second is at the end of the day Timothee Chalamet is a white man and he is going to be okay. He is going to be given way more opportunities than his peers and he will have more opportunities than normal to finally win an Oscar. Maybe it’s because I’m writing this during Black History Month but there’s something about an average white man who still has a long way to go before he can be considered one of the greats, get on that stage and essentially tell us he he deserves this.
The third is that he’s never really won anything at this scale in his career. I can understand feeling like you deserve some type of accolades after constantly being nominated along with the best but not quite winning. After working with movie, directing, and producing legends, after being able to pick and choose whatever projects you want that will likely get you an Oscar win. Being in these spaces from such a young age and being awarded these privileges will warp reality so that you would think you deserve all these accolades without realizing that for the vast majority of peers you are surrounded by, their careers have been crafted over decades.
I’m still a Timmy Tim fan and unfortunately he has been my whiteboy of the month since June of 2022. This moment was just a miss for me.
