Timothée Hal Chalamet was born in Manhattan, to
Nicole Flender, a real estate broker and dancer, and Marc Chalamet, a UNICEF editor. His mother, who is from New York, is Jewish, of Russian Jewish and Austrian Jewish descent. His father, who is from Nîmes, France, is of French and English ancestry. He is the brother of actress
Pauline Chalamet, a nephew of director
Rodman Flender, and a grandson of screenwriter
Harold Flender.
He grew up in an artistic family, appearing in commercials and the New York theatre scene, and attending the LaGuardia High School of Music, Art and Performing Arts, where his classmate and friend was actor
Ansel Elgort (the two later received their first Golden Globe nominations in the same year, 2017). For a time, Timothée also attended Columbia University.
He made his film debut in 2014, as a high school student in
Jason Reitman's
Men, Women & Children (2014) and
Matthew McConaughey's character's teenage son in
Interstellar (2014). He subsequently had sizable roles in several indie films, playing the younger version of writer Stephen Elliott in
The Adderall Diaries (2015), the male lead, Zac, in the drama
One and Two (2015), and Billy in the road trip drama
Miss Stevens (2016). On stage, he has appeared in the plays The Talls, by
Anna Kerrigan, and
John Patrick Shanley's autobiographical Prodigal Son, while on television, he has had a minor role in the film
Loving Leah (2009), a big part in
Law & Order (1990), and meatier roles on the shows
Royal Pains (2009) and
Homeland (2011), among other work.
He broke out in 2017, appearing in notable supporting roles, as a soldier in the western
Hostiles (2017) and a high school crush of the title character in
Lady Bird (2017), and in a leading role as Elio, an Italian Jewish seventeen year-old who romances his father's older assistant, played by
Armie Hammer, in the
Luca Guadagnino drama
Call Me by Your Name (2017). Timothée's role as Elio received significant critical acclaim, and he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor, and the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor, Drama, and won many critics' groups' awards for Best Actor of the Year.
In 2018, he starred as Nic Sheff, who suffers from substance abuse problems, in the drama
Beautiful Boy (2018). In 2019, he will headline the
Woody Allen comedy
A Rainy Day in New York (2019), with
Selena Gomez, play Henry V of England, King from 1413 to 1422, in the historical drama
The King (2019), and embody love interest Laurie in Greta Gerwig's take on
Little Women (2019).