Nathan Lane Absolutely Eviscerates Timothée Chalamet on ‘The View’: ‘What a Schmuck’

Timothée Chalamet‘s decision to step on a rake right as voting closed for the 2026 Oscars, before which he was considered to be the far and away frontrunner for Best Actor for Marty Supreme, continued to earn backlash on Thursday (March 12). This time, it was from Nathan Lane, who appeared on The View to promote his starring role in the upcoming Broadway iteration of Death of a Salesman.

Upon joining the table, Lane was immediately asked about his take on Chalamet’s comment, in which he said that ballet and opera were things “no one cares about” now, and he unleashed a scathing takedown of both the words and the man who said them.

“Oh, what a schmuck,” Lane said, after moderator Whoopi Goldberg introduced the issue.

“He opened his mouth, poor guy, leave him alone,” Joy Behar remarked.

“Well, one doesn’t want to give this more attention than it deserves. And yet,” Lane continued. “It was kind of kaleidoscopic in its stupidity and insensitivity and yet strangely telling about where we are in this country. Let me explain. Let me get to the comedy portion of our program. First of all, one should remember, people will be going to see Swan Lake and La Traviata long after someone at a dinner party says, ‘Who was Timothée Chalamet?’ It’s the show business circle of life.”

But Lane wasn’t done with his takedown of Timothée Chalamet with that, no no.

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“The bigger question is: Why was there a town hall meeting with Matthew McConaughey and Timothée Chalamet? I mean, who deemed this meeting of the minds necessary? … Why isn’t there a town hall meeting with Democrats discussing how to get this lunatic out of the White House?” Lane said. “Then I realized, ‘Oh, he’s still promoting that endless ping pong movie.’ And, you know, I’ve got news for Timmy: If you think nobody cares about opera and ballet, I can’t tell you how much we don’t care about ping pong.”

After a beat of audience laughter, Lane continued, “He was doing it with Matthew McConaughey, so I’m thinking some weed was smoked before it. This may just be a tragic case of terribly unfunny people trying to be funny, which always ends in disaster.”

The View, weekdays, 11a/10c, ABC