Fans roast Timothee Chalamet for ‘trying too hard’ as he arrives at London premiere on an E-bike-Brooke Ivey Johnson-Entertainment – Metro

Timothee Chalamet arrived at the London premiere of his new film, A Complete Unknown, casually astride a Lime E-bike, as you do.

In the hours since the images of the Dune star, 28, riding the transport method of choice of the slightly buzzed East London barists dropped online, people have been trying to make sense of the decision. 

Many outlets have hypothesised that – given Chalamet’s insistence on method dressing as Bob Dylan for the press tour so far – the bike was a goofy nod to the folk singer’s motorcycle.

But one can’t help but notice a sense of gritted-teeth determination in everyone’s attempts to explain the weird stunt.

It feels like your new boyfriend said something offensive at family dinner for the fifth time, and you’re forced to half-heartedly defend him to your sister with: ‘He’s just got a really dry sense of humour; he was being ironic.’

W Magazine bent over backward to explain the choice, writing: ‘The stunt seemed to be a very tongue-in-cheek reference to Dylan’s famous 1965 appearance at the Newport Folk Festival when he performed with an electric band after years of using only acoustic instruments.’

Timothee Chalamet showed up to the premiere of A Complete Unknown on a Lime bike…for some reason (Picture: Getty Images)

The stunt has attracted plenty of attention (Picture: BENJAMIN CREMEL/AFP via Getty Images)

He even took the time to end the ride on his Lime Bike app (Picture: Ian West/PA Wire)

Dazed was even more generous, saying the stunt made the actor a ‘true Londoner’ and called his recent flurry of attention-grabbing appearances a ‘generational run of a press tour.’

But fans are far less impressed, with many taking to social media to roll their eyes at the stunt.

@notLugo posted: ‘Alright, he’s trying too hard now.’

@alexxdebut agreed: ‘Timothee just wants attention ….’

@the1101 wrote: ‘This guy is the worst. “Look at me, I’m eccentric.”’

@marissnights wrote: ‘Now he’s TRYING to be random. it’s not funny when you try…’

@MrDeanHarvey bemoaned the stunt, posting: ‘Oh dear – very cringe.’

At least Vernon Kay appeared to really enjoy the stunt (Picture: Lia Toby/Getty Images)

The actor wore a custom-designed suit by London designer Martine Rose (Picture: Dave Benett/WireImage)

But what else could we expect from our Timmy?

We’ve given an enormous, global platform to a person who is a class clown at his very core – and, like all class clowns, the more attention we give him, the more outlandish his bits become.

We’re all familiar with that kid in every secondary school who sits in the back of the classroom and, with seemingly boundless energy at 8 am on a Tuesday, throws out witty comments to varying degrees of approval from his peers.

Timmy has been method dressing as Bob Dylan for much of the film’s press run (Picture: TheStewartofNY/FilmMagic)

He even copied an outfit Bob Dylan wore in 2003 (Picture: Getty Images)

While these characters can be charming, they also simmer with a certain level of desperation, seeming to feed with the gusto of a starving man on the smattered laughter the class offers them.

Anyone who has taught adolescents knows the risk of giving these harmless but disruptive presences too much airtime.

Once the class starts laughing at the class clown’s ploys for attention, the jokester gets high on the power, and you can be sure they’ll continue to level up their stunts until they’re rapping about statistics in a backward cap.

We all found it charming when Timmy showed up at the New York biopic premiere in a replica of the outfit Bob Dylan wore to a 2003 Sundance Film Festival. We giggled and clapped and said: ‘More! How fun! His little mustache isn’t creepy; it’s charming!’

And now look what our open hearts have earned us. A dirty lime bike on a red carpet paired with a custom-designed suit by Martine Rose.

Still, some fans were charmed by the quirky display, with X user @diskomfkitty writing: ‘It’s a fun and unexpected way to make an appearance!’

@nathaliemayy agreed: ‘That’s such a vibe! love how he keeps it casual and relatable, like who else would show up on a lime bike?’

Many stubbornly believe Timmy was still somehow paying tribute to Bob Dylan with the stunt, given that his outfit was reminiscent of one Dylan wore in 1965 at the Savoy Hotel in London.

Throughout the filming and press process for the film, Timmy immersed himself so deeply into the character that his name even appeared as ‘Bob Dylan’ on the film’s call sheets.

Many fans thought Timmy’s premiere look was a reference to a 1965 outfit worn by Bob Dylan at the Savoy Hotel in London (Picture: Alamy/Shutterstock)

The actor completely transformed into the folk singer for the film (Picture: METROPOLIS/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images)

The actor isolated himself entirely for three months: ‘No visitors, no friends, no reps, no nothing,’ he said.

‘It sounds pretentious,’ he admitted to Rolling Stone, ‘but panic fueled me. I didn’t want to lose a moment of discovery as the character because of my phone or any distraction, so while I was in it, that was my eternal focus.’

Of course, there’s no such thing as bad publicity, and if the actor intended to draw more attention to his new film, the stunt was decidedly a success.

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