Charlize Theron has called out Timothée Chalamet for remarks he previously made about ballet, describing them as “reckless”.
At a CNN and Variety event earlier this year, Chalamet spoke about the kind of projects he’s not interested in taking on, suggesting he wouldn’t want to be involved in “ballet or opera” if it meant helping to “keep this thing alive” despite believing that “no one cares about [it] anymore”.
He said: “I admire people, and I’ve done it myself, [who] go on a talk show and go, ‘Hey, we gotta keep movie theaters alive. You know, we gotta keep this genre alive’.
“And another part of me feels like, if people wanna see it, like ‘Barbie,’ like ‘Oppenheimer,’ they’re gonna go see it and go out of their way and be loud and proud about it. And I don’t want to be working in ballet or opera, or things where it’s like, ‘Hey, keep this thing alive.’ Even though it’s like, no one cares about this anymore. All respect to the ballet and opera people out there. I just lost 14 cents in viewership.”
The comments sparked backlash from some viewers at the time. One person wrote in response to a YouTube clip from the event: “How can ONE BE an artist with hating on other ART FORMS.”
Another added: “Oof. Professional ballet dancer here… that hurt.”
Now, Theron has weighed in on the remarks during an interview with The New York Times, saying she hopes their paths cross.
“Dance is probably one of the hardest things I ever did. Dancers are superheroes. What they put their bodies through in complete silence,” she said.
“Oh, boy, I hope I run into him one day. That was a very reckless comment on an art form, two art forms, that we need to lift up constantly because, yes, they do have a hard time. But in 10 years, AI is going to be able to do Timothée’s job, but it will not be able to replace a person on a stage dancing live.”
Theron, who previously trained at New York City’s Joffrey Ballet School, also addressed what dance gave her early on, along with the physical toll that can come with trying to succeed in the field.
“And we shouldn’t [expletive] on other art forms. Dance taught me discipline. It taught structure. It taught hard work. It taught me to be tough. It’s borderline abusive. There were several times that I had blood infections from blisters that just never healed. And you don’t get a day off. I’m literally talking about bleeding through your shoes. And that’s something that you have to practice every single day, the mind-set of just, you don’t give up, there’s no other option, you keep going.”