What Will Timothée Chalamet’s Marty Supreme Era Look Like?

A new season of Timothée Chalamet is upon us. You probably remember last December, when Chalamet was everywhere and anywhere promoting his Bob Dylan biopic, A Complete Unknown. He dressed up as Dylan in a funny outfit, he sang Dylan songs as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live, and he impressed your dad with his deep knowledge of college football. He also got on Instagram Live and watched Bob Dylan sing “Blind Willie McTell” before dancing to “I Gotta Feeling.” The guy is down to do whatever it takes to sell a movie, which brings us to the current moment. For the third Christmas in a row, Chalamet is headlining a major film, and this time, it’s Josh Safdie’s ping-pong flick Marty Supreme.

The film screened for the first time at the New York Film Festival on Monday, where it received rapturous reviews from seemingly everyone in attendance. On Tuesday night, Chalamet officially kicked off this new era of his — and he is treating these movies as eras — with another Instagram Live video. The actor later put it up on his other channels, so we can all watch together:

Directed by Aidan Zamiri and shot by Dune cinematographer Greig Fraser, this is not just some slapdash little promo clip. In the video, Chalamet sits in a glass box wearing a giant ping-pong ball on his head and being assaulted by regular-size ping-pong balls. Around him are other ping-pong heads, all playing ping-pong. Eventually, Chalamet leaves his box, reveals his buzz cut (which he pretty clearly got for Dune 3 but will apparently be with us for his Marty Supreme press run), and makes his way across a field in that sick Marty Supreme windbreaker. He eventually makes his way to a press-junket set, where he sits quietly for a long time before telling the camera, “Marty Supreme is an American film that comes out on Christmas 2025.” This is the kind of thing you’d do to promote an experimental-album release, not necessarily a two-and-a-half-hour ping-pong epic.

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Chalamet clearly likes to get freaky with it, so here are some free ideas for his next few months of Marty Supreme promo:

• A series of increasingly odd wigs in every filmed appearance. Why not take advantage of his smooth head?
• An appearance on Shark Tank alongside his Marty Supreme co-star Kevin O’Leary. (He’s pitching, not investing.)
• A GRWM video on Kylie Jenner’s TikTok where he’s playing Kylie. It’s not a joke, but rather a commentary on performance and celebrity. It’s his best role to date.
• A faux 30 for 30 documentary about the character Marty Mauser becoming (I’m guessing) the world’s best ping-pong player. This should play on ESPN as if it’s real, and it should not be addressed by Chalamet at all.

Basically, if the launch video is any indication, we’re about to be seeing Chalamet everywhere, and he’s going to be having fun with it. And you know what? I’m buying what he’s selling. When everyone is dying to go on Hot Ones, hire a world-class cinematographer to make your funky little Instagram video. Let’s have some fun!