Whoopi Goldberg Addresses Timothée Chalamet Opera And Ballet Backlash: 'He's A Boy To Me'

Whoopi Goldberg is unimpressed with Timothée Chalamet’s recent disparaging comments about opera and ballet.

The Oscar winner weighed in during Monday’s episode of The View, after Timothée landed himself in hot water with remarks suggesting that “no one cares” about the prestigious artforms.

Last month, the Marty Supreme actor sat down with his former Interstellar co-star Matthew McConaughey for an hour-long conversation for Variety.

During the interview, Timothée discussed the importance of people continuing to frequent cinemas, claiming: “I admire when actors go on a talk show and go, ‘Hey, we’ve got to keep movie theatres alive. You know, we’ve got to 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’.”

He then claimed: “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,” he quickly added, remarking that he “just lost 14 cents in viewership”.

When Timothée’s comments became more widespread, he has faced a wave of backlash, particularly from those in the fields of opera and ballet.

During Monday’s edition of The View, moderator Whoopi voiced her take, telling the Call Me By Your Name actor indirectly: “You come from a dance family, so when you crap on somebody else’s art form, it doesn’t feel good.

“You probably didn’t realise [what you’d said] until you said, ‘Oh, I’m in trouble’.”

“I’m just saying. Be careful, boy,” she continued. “He is a boy to me. No disrespect.

“Really, don’t apologise when you’ve [been insulting]. It doesn’t sound right. You can’t say, ‘Oh, this is dumb, no disrespect’. That’s absolute disrespect.”

Co-presenter Sunny Hostin was similarly critical, lamenting: “I’m offended and disappointed in what he said. I didn’t realise he was that vapid and that shallow.”

Meanwhile, chart-topping rapper Doja Cat also put Timothée on blast in a now-deleted TikTok.

“Opera is 400 years old. Ballet is 500 years old,” the Grammy winner said. “Somebody named Timothée Chalamet – big guy, by the way – had the nerve to say on camera that nobody cares about it.

“People give a fuck,” Doja insisted. “You show up in a nice outfit. You sit the fuck down and shut the fuck up. That’s the usual etiquette around those things. Maybe learn something from that.” 

The controversy around Timothée arose just days before the 2026 Oscars, where he is in the running for the Best Actor prize.

His 2026 awards season got off to a strong start, with wins at the Critics’ Choice Awards and Golden Globes, though since then, the prize has gone different ways at both the Baftas and Actor Awards.