The events of Oct. 27 proved to all marketing majors that advertising works. When simple signs on printer paper went up around New York City inviting people to a Timothée Chalamet look-alike competition, a photo went viral of Chalamet walking past one of the ads. In the weeks leading up to the event, fans planned to attend and speculated online whether or not the real Chalamet would show up. In a whirlwind of internet glory, he did.
The original posters included a QR code to an event signup and the time and place — at 1 p.m. on Oct. 27 under the arch in Washington Square Park, Timothees everywhere were to assemble. It certainly raised a lot of interesting questions: what kind of people would be signing up for this, how the competition would play out and whether or not Chalamet would patronize his own look-alike contest.
Upon arrival, curiosity waned, and chaos took over. Attendees were concentrated just north of the arch, making a circle around police officers talking to one of the competitors who was eventually detained, to chants of “free him” from the crowd. Hordes of people made it impossible to maneuver your way in or out of the park, but everything turned to whispers once there were rumors of the “real Timothée” making his way through the crowd — which I, myself, was guilty of spreading to my friends when I locked eyes with someone in a baseball cap and black mask, though I was convinced I was being irrational. Seconds later, screams erupted when Chalamet appeared in the center, shocking the finalists who came to the park to prove that they looked just like him.
The public gathering attracted a bizarrely wide range of attendees, from journalists to police officers and Chalamet superfans to that one girl handing business cards with her email to look-alikes. For many, this felt like an event that would only happen in New York, and being there felt like an incredible experience that resonated beyond seeing a celebrity in the flesh.
Chalamet walked right past Paige Lesperance, FCRH ’25, who said that she went just for fun but also had hope that Chalamet himself would show up. “I was beyond excited and shocked when he did,” she said. After the event, which had to be moved out of Washington Square Park due to the lack of a permit, the finalists and onlookers traveled but did not lose steam.
One of the many look-alikes, Josh Steckler, FCRH ’23, participated in the event. Steckler said he had entered the competition after being sent the posters by many of his friends, as he has often been told he looks like Chalamet. There was no official process that the competition’s hosts followed, but instead relied on crowd participation to judge the event. Steckler shared that “the first round the crowd cheered if they thought you looked like Timmy, or yelled ‘no’ if not. I received a ‘no.’ Afterwards, the hosts picked four finalists, interviewed them, then the crowd cheered for their favorite.” Amongst the other look-alikes, he said they all talked about how strange the circumstances of their meeting were, as well as relating about how often they were all compared to Chalamet.
With the help of Chalamet’s surprise appearance, the event blew up on the internet, gaining publicity from personal Instagram accounts, all the way to the New York Times. In all of the media coverage about what many expected to be a trivial event, Steckler said he found it “hilarious and somewhat overwhelming… I had journalists from the Washington Post, the New York Post and New York Magazine reach out to me for an interview.” And lest he forget, The Fordham Ram.
