Timothée Chalamet ballet and opera controversy boosts ticket sales

Timothée Chalamet’s press tour for “Marty Supreme” has not only driven ticket sales for the Oscar-nominated film, it’s had the unexpected side effect of boosting tens of thousands of dollars in revenue for opera houses.

During a town hall interview with Matthew McConaughey in late February, Chalamet discussed the state of ballet and opera at one point and suggested they were irrelevant, eliciting backlash across social media over the past week.

“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,” Chalamet said. “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.”

He then joked, “I just lost 14 cents in viewership.”

Ballet companies and opera houses have made tongue-in-cheek remarks in response, inviting Chalamet to their shows and even offering discounts for their patrons. The Hawai’i Opera Theatre is offering a 25% discount for the May world premiere of “Kamalehua: The Sheltering Tree,” the first Hawaiian opera, if you use the code TIMOTHEE25. And Seattle Opera offered a 14% discount for “Carmen” over the weekend if you used the code TIMOTHEE.

Seattle Opera brought in $28,828 worth in sales through the discount code alone, with total weekend sales standing at about $74,000, said Joshua Gailey, the communications and public engagement manager for Seattle Opera. 

“We sold a total of 203 tickets with that discount code over the weekend, bringing in 61% more in sales than we estimate we would have seen without it,” Gailey said. 

Ticket prices for its production of “Carmen,” an opera about a soldier's obsession with the titular character, have ranged between $39 and $445. 

“This past weekend demonstrated that many people do, in fact, care deeply about opera and ballet. There’s room to love art of all scales and sizes, and the best way to ensure that these art forms can continue for years to come is to make sure we support them,” Gailey said.   

At the Hawai’i Opera Theatre, revenue over the weekend for the world premiere of “Kamalehua” stood at $7,800 even though the opera is debuting months from now. For comparison, the average weekend sales for the theater during a “non-show week” is between $250 and $1,200, said Elizabeth E. Wilson, the director of marketing and communications.

“So this was a huge uptick for us,” Wilson said. 

About 95 tickets using the Timothee promo code were sold between Friday and Monday night. 

Tickets currently range between $40 and $145 without the discount. The show, which is sung in ‘ōlelo Hawai’i and is set in the mid 19th century, explores the challenges the Hawaiian Kingdom faced to maintain independence.  

Nearly 30 of the patrons who purchased tickets were “new to file,” which means this is the first time they’re attending a performance at the venue, Wilson said. 

Wilson said she’s excited that so many newcomers bought tickets and said it shows that the controversy “is making people take a wider consideration of the existence of opera,” and leading them to check in “with their local arts communities to see what it’s all about.”

“One way or another, it’s getting more people to talk about the opera. Especially with these comments coming from someone who is relevant in the public zeitgeist, it can be used as a good tactic to bring in a whole new generation of younger arts enjoyers who may have never given any thought to opera prior,” Wilson said. 

The Chalamet controversy has ignited conversations about the economic struggles that opera and ballet face, their accessibility and ability to adapt. While many found Chalamet’s comments dismissive, experts acknowledge that there are financial barriers to access when it comes to these art forms and say that people in these industries are fighting to attract newer audiences. 

The economic challenges within opera and ballet 

There’s a lot to celebrate within the industry. The Metroplitan Opera’s new production of Richard Wagner’s “Tristan and Isolde” sold out and will be attended by 30,000 people over the course of eight performances, said the Met Opera’s general manager, Peter Gelb, in an emailed statement. 

“Opera thrives because with each performance it offers the possibility of a transformative experience equal to the highest levels of artistic expression,” Gelb said. 

And Opera Philadelphia’s world premiere of “Complications in Sue,” which features the work of 10 composers, sold out, said Anthony Roth Costanzo, the general director and president of Opera Philadelphia.

There were more people at one performance than there would be at a movie theater, Costanzo pointed out. “I do think that the collective energy of those art forms makes it feel incredibly alive when you're there,” Costanzo said. 

But despite these successes, it can sometimes be harder to persuade someone to go to the opera or ballet than to watch a movie, Costanzo said. 

“If you're trying to convince someone to try something, and they have to pay $200 to try it, they might not come no matter what they think of it. That's the first barrier to entry,” Costanzo said. 

Wilson said she thinks the Chalamet controversy is prompting those in the industry to reexamine opera’s history and “the possibilities of making opera more accessible to a wider range of diverse audiences.” 

“Despite the careless nature of Chalamet’s comments, and the negative sentiment around classical art forms that he is spreading, whether intentionally or not, the incident is not all bad,” Wilson said. 

Nearly 80% of ongoing opera attendees are white, and 70% of them are 55 or older, according to a report from Opera America. 

Marc Scorca, president emeritus of Opera America, told Marketplace in an interview last month that the arts are facing economic challenges across the country. 

“Although box office numbers are up this year over last year and contributions are holding on, costs are escalating even faster. So opera companies are strapped to continue producing the number of productions and performances that they do, “ Scorca said.

The obstacles aren’t just economic: These art forms also have to contend with the notion that they’re just too stodgy, too unrelatable. 

“I think we're also battling the preconception of what opera is or what ballet is, and that it's not fun or that it doesn't speak to us or who we are,” Costanzo said. “And actually, I think that there is something so cathartic and so deeply emotional about opera.”

Costanzo said some people are also concerned about what they should wear and are anxious about not knowing the language, but he noted that everyone is welcome, regardless of their familiarity with opera. 

“You can come to our opera house without knowing anything and actually have a really great time,” Costanzo said. 

He compares the experience to starting a new TV series. “It takes you a minute where you're going to be bored and you're going to be like, ‘Wait, who's this character and who's that character?’ But once you settle into it, it is so amazing,” Costanzo said. 

When it comes to ballet, the art form has alienated people in the past — with good reason, said Jennifer Fisher, a professor of dance at the University of California, Irvine, and the author of “Nutcracker Nation.”  

“It’s been exclusive, it's expensive, it's been very white. The gender roles are limited. So there are a lot of ways that it doesn't speak to people,” Fisher said. 

Fisher said she thinks Chalamet’s remarks echo what some insiders say about ballet and opera, which is that they’re on a shoestring.

“These are very expensive art forms, and they just simply don't operate economically like other things that make a profit,” Fisher said. 

But Fisher remains optimistic about ballet’s survival because it “suggests to us what it is to be human and what beauty is.”

“It just speaks with the body when words run out,” she said.

One way to expand access? Lower prices

Opera companies like Seattle Opera and Opera Philadelphia are reimagining what the economic model for the art form can look like.

Costanzo said when he first arrived at Opera Philadelphia, tickets were very expensive, so he decided to institute the Pick Your Price ticket initiative during the 2024-25 season. Patrons only had to pay $11 per ticket, with the option of paying a higher amount ranging between $20 and $250. 

“We sold out the entire season within three weeks, and when we looked at that audience, it was 67% first-time ticket buyers and 69% people under 45,” Costanzo said. The Pick Your Price initiative returned for the 2025-26 season. 

“In Philadelphia, after making our tickets all $11, it really looks like the city of Philadelphia,” Costanzo said. 

Yes, Opera Philadelphia has had to take a cut in revenue as a result. But it also gets to spend less on marketing, since it doesn’t have to focus on solely targeting the operagoers who can afford higher prices, Costanzo said.

The initiative has also been able to attract people who want to donate to social causes.

“There are foundations, there are patrons, and there are corporations who want to give to us because they see how it transforms people's lives to have access to art,” Costanzo said. 

Seattle Opera also offers discount programs and allows patrons to pay what they want for select performances. Tickets that are part of its Pay What You Wish initiative start at a minimum of $10 and have a suggested price of $35. Over on the other side of the country, the Met Opera offers $25 tickets for patrons that it selects through a lottery.

In general, newer opera audiences better represent all age groups and include more attendees who are people of color, according to the Opera America report. 

Costanzo sees the upsides of “Timothée Chalamet-gate.” 

“I say thank you to Timothée for letting us have our moment. I think he's decided to work and make movies more accessible, and I'm doing the same thing. I'm trying to make an art form more accessible,” Costanzo said. “And he just said that my art form is more difficult to do that with. And I'm like, ‘Yeah, I like a challenge.’”