Timothée Chalamet is the youngest multiple Best Actor Oscar nominee since James Dean
Youth is not wasted on the young, especially if you’re Timothée Chalamet. The A Complete Unknown star made Oscar history in more ways than one with his Best Actor nomination for the Bob Dylan biopic on Thursday.
Chalamet, who turned 29 on Dec. 27, is the youngest person to score multiple Best Actor nominations since James Dean. As writer and film historian Mark Harris first noted on Bluesky, both men accomplished this feat before the age of 30. Chalamet received his first bid at 22 for 2017’s Call Me by Your Name. Dean died at 24 in September 1955 in a car crash. Less than six months later, Dean received a posthumous nomination for East of Eden. He earned a second one the following year for Giant and remains the only performer to receive multiple posthumous nominations.
Chalamet is the youngest nominee in his category, which includes The Brutalist‘s Adrien Brody (51), Sing Sing‘s Colman Domingo (54), Conclave‘s Ralph Fiennes (62), and The Apprentice‘s Sebastian Stan (42).
The star was already in the Oscar record books as his Call Me by Your Name nomination made Chalamet the third-youngest Best Actor nominee ever — behind Jackie Cooper, who was 9 when he was nominated for 1931’s Skippy, and then-19-year-old Mickey Rooney for 1939’s Babes in Arms — and the first man born in the 1990s to be nominated in the category. With his mention for A Complete Unknown, Chalamet is now also the first ’90s-born man to collect multiple acting nominations. Only two other men born in the ’90s have managed to secure Best Actor nominations since Chalamet’s first one — and they were in the same year. Two years ago, Austin Butler, born in 1991, and Paul Mescal, born in 1996, made the cut for Elvis and Aftersun, respectively.
SEE Full list of Oscar nominations
The numbers are not that high in Best Supporting Actor, either, as only six men born in the ’90s have been nominated there, including Yura Borisov (Anora) this year. That’s below the 15 total ’90s-born women nominated across both actress categories, counting this year’s first-time nominees Mikey Madison (Anora), Monica Barbaro (A Complete Unknown), and Ariana Grande (Wicked). The discrepancy shouldn’t surprise anyone since the Oscars — like the industry — have historically rewarded young women early in their careers and men circa middle age, when men usually book their juiciest roles, which makes Chalamet’s two noms prior to 30 even more notable. Marlee Matlin, then 21, is the youngest Best Actress winner for 1986’s Children of a Lesser God — the 10 youngest winners in the category range from 21 to 26 — while the youngest Best Actor champ is Brody, who was three weeks shy of his 30th birthday when he prevailed for The Pianist 22 years ago. (Timothy Hutton is the youngest male acting winner overall, having won at 20 in supporting for 1980’s Ordinary People.)
While Chalamet is the first ’90s dude to exit the one-nom club, three ’90s ladies have already done so. Saoirse Ronan and Jennifer Lawrence hold four nominations each, and Margot Robbie has two. Lawrence became the first ’90s-born performer to win an Oscar when she claimed Best Actress for 2012’s Silver Linings Playbook at 22 and remains the category’s second-youngest champ. Ariana DeBose became the second one when she took home Best Supporting Actress for West Side Story three years ago.
Is it time for a ’90s guy to cross that threshold and grab Oscar gold? If Chalamet triumphs on March 2, he’ll add another age-related record to his ledger because he would dethrone Brody as the category’s youngest winner… while beating him. Can’t make this stuff up. Brody has already won the drama Golden Globe over Chalamet, but A Complete Unknown has been a late-breaking hit and received eight Oscar nominations, including Best Picture and Best Director for James Mangold.