If you thought that dedicating your entire life to an art form would make you appreciate anyone who does the same for their own art, Timothée Chalamet has news for you.
In a recent Variety & CNN Town Hall, he made his views on older, “classical” art forms incredibly clear, saying: “I don’t want to be working in ballet or opera or things where it’s like, ‘Hey, keep this thing alive, even though like no one cares about this anymore.’”
As a former ballet-obsessed teenager whose life once revolved around the art form, Chalamet dropped about 70 levels in my celebrity rankings as soon as I heard this quote. If my social media timelines give any indication of the general ballet community’s reactions, I know that I’m far from alone. Every dancer that I’ve ever followed is up in arms, frantically creating and reposting content that critiques the statement from every angle possible.
There is plenty that can be said in an attempt to disprove the idea that no one cares, such as the oversaturation of female ballet dancers in the industry, the fact that opera houses still regularly sell out, and the amount of outrage visible online. What really interested me, however, was how easily Chalamet dismissed these things just because they’re not currently at the height of American cultural relevance. I don’t think that this attitude is rare at all in a society that idolizes constant “progress” in every aspect of our lives. When our eyes are always on trends, when we are constantly prioritizing newness and equating it with improvement, is there value in keeping older art forms alive? As social standards change over time, is there something to be said for pushing the traditions to evolve?
Maybe one of the most obvious reasons to “keep alive” an older art form is the rich history that comes with age. Ballet, for example, started to develop in the French courts of the mid-1600s and is therefore almost 500 years old. The first opera was composed about 50 years before that.
Choreographers, composers, costume designers, performers, etc. span centuries of social, political and cultural changes. Each performance created is a marker of its time. Some retell specific historical events like the opera “Anna Bolena” (based on Anne Boleyn). Others indicate trends and evolutions, such as the 1909 ballet “Les Sylphides.” According to a 2023 article titled “Fokine’s Les Sylphides Introduces Abstract Ballet,” it was the first of many ballets to avoid clear narratives in favor of less typical forms of storytelling, which was not a standalone change in the ballet world but a part of a wider modernist movement.
By engaging with works that were created before us, we get to reintroduce ourselves to the past events that led to our present. We can see and hear different perspectives in new ways, engaging with unique methods of storytelling. Creating or engaging with new works today allows us to contribute to the continual development of that extensive history. To me, this is reason enough to celebrate anyone’s efforts to keep older art forms alive.
That being said, staying alive doesn’t mean staying stagnant. If joining in historical traditions means adding our own experiences to the mix, then modern interpretations should be able to reflect changes in social standards without losing their essence. Celebrating a wider array of body types in professional ballet companies, for example, would go a long way to reduce standards for dancers that are anything but healthy or body-neutral. As a general social awareness concerning harmful stereotypes and caricatures increases, ballet fans are calling on companies to eliminate any racist caricatures that remain in classics like “The Nutcracker.”
Pacific Northwest Ballet is a great example of a ballet company that honors the overall tradition while remaining sensitive to the aspects of tradition that have caused harm. They have consistently hired and promoted dancers with less-represented body types, challenged stereotypical portrayals of extreme masculinity and femininity, and worked with organizations such as Final Bow for Yellow Face to rework their versions of older ballets. Their methods are working well. They are widely known in the United States and consistently sell out their shows. Other recent methods of changing with the times for both ballet and similar art forms include embracing social media marketing, filming performances for accessibility purposes and mixing influence from other styles into composition and choreography.
Instead of being a break from tradition, I think that these changes are actually part of the tradition for classical arts of reflecting what is relevant to their time. Just as the rise of abstract ballets like “Les Sylphides” highlighted the modernist movement, I see no reason why we can’t continue to meet the new with the old. There is real value in looking towards our past as we create our present, and I don’t want to live in a world where all that matters is what’s most current. Surely we can bridge the gap and enjoy the rich history of storytelling in all of its different forms.
