Doja Cat walks back comments criticizing Timothée Chalamet, says she just ‘wanted to look like a hero’

Doja Cat joined a chorus of Black performers who called out Chalamet for making dismissive comments recently about opera and

Mar 12, 2026 0

Doja Cat walks back comments criticizing Timothée Chalamet, says she just ‘wanted to look like a hero’

Doja Cat joined a chorus of Black performers who called out Chalamet for making dismissive comments recently about opera and ballet.

Doja Cat is now saying that her video calling out Timothée Chalamet was “a way of garnering clicks,” and that she hopped on the bandwagon of people “patting each other on the back in the comments sections.”

“What I was doing yesterday was virtue signaling because I wanted to connect and I knew that Timothée’s goof up was something that I could leverage in order for people to connect with me and f— with me,” Doja Cat said in a TikTok posted on Tuesday. “And it’s easy. It’s a modern way to garner clicks, likes, approval and all kinds of things like that from people. And so I did that yesterday, and I didn’t really think about why I was doing it.”

The “Kiss Me More” artist called her criticism of Chalamet’s comments about the opera and ballet an opportunity for her to “seem sincere,” and that she’s never been to a ballet or an opera.

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“That was the perfect material for me to seem sincere. But the truth is, I don’t know anything about opera. I don’t know anything about ballet, and I’ve never been to either shows,” she said. “And I think I just wanted a hug. I think that’s all that I wanted. I wanted a hug. I wanted to feel like I was part of something bigger than myself. I wanted to be pat on the back the way everybody else is patting each other on the back in the comments sections. And I wanted to look like a hero, and that’s what happened. And when I got it, I didn’t like it so much.”

Chalamet, who is currently nominated for a Best Actor Oscar for his performance in the film “Marty Supreme,” received backlash from different artist communities after he made dismissive comments to Matthew McConaughey about ballet and opera during a CNN and Variety town hall in February.

“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.’ All respect to all the ballet and opera people out there,” Chalamet said. Following the crowd’s laughter, he then joked, “I just lost 14 cents in viewership. I just took shots for no reason.”

Doja Cat joined a chorus of performers, which includes ballet dancer Misty Copeland, in criticizing Chalamet. In a now-deleted TikTok, Doja defended the art, and told Chalamet he should learn from the etiquette of attending a show, in which “You sit the f–k down and shut the f–k up.”

“It doesn’t matter if the industry is having a tough time at any time, which a lot of industries have a tough time,” she said. “Your industry has a tough time, my industry has a tough time. Doesn’t mean people don’t care about it … There’s still an audience.”