Mallery McKay April 19th, 2026 - 8:40 PM
Charlize Theron has joined the list of actors who have spoken against Timothée Chalamet’s disparaging comments against the art forms of ballet and opera. Theron poked fun at Chalamet in her Saturday interview with The New York Times when prompted about the mental challenges of doing physical roles, explaining,
Dance is probably one of the hardest things I ever done. Dancers are superheroes. What they put their bodies through in complete silence. Sorry, Timothée Chalamet. 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, A.I. 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.
The Academy Award-winning actress continued,
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.
Chalamet faced fierce backlash not just from the opera and ballet community over his remarks, but also from Hollywood in general. Other stars, like Conan O’Brien and Steven Spielberg, have even responded, poking fun at Chalamet’s words. With Spielberg commenting at a SXSW keynote conversation,
At the end of a really good movie experience, we are all united with a whole bunch of feelings that we walk into the daylight with, or into the nighttime with. And there’s nothing like that. It happens in movies, and in concerts. And it happens in ballet and opera, by the way. And we want that to be sustained. We want that to go forever.
Chalamet seems to feel the opposite of Spielberg, as he believes “nobody cares about [opera and ballet] anymore,” following that with a joking, “I just lost 14 cents in viewership.” The Marty Supreme actor has yet to officially comment on his remarks from February.
