Timothee Chalamet set as ‘SNL’ host and musical guest as ‘A Complete Unknown’ Oscar campaign continues

Like a rolling stone gathers no moss, Timothee Chalamet’s awards campaign for A Complete Unknown continues unabated. On Friday, NBC announced Chalamet will host the Jan. 25 edition of Saturday Night Live and serve as the night’s musical guest. The expectation is that Chalamet, who plays Bob Dylan in the new film, will perform Dylan songs on the broadcast. 

Regardless of the playlist, Chalamet’s dual role on the broadcast will make some Saturday Night Live history. He’s among a select few non-professional singers or traditional musicians who have served as SNL hosts and performed as musicians on the same show, joining names like Lily Tomlin, Desi Arnaz, and Deion Sanders. (Sanders, who hosted SNL in 1995, had a musical guest on his show – Bon Jovi – but also got to perform selections from his then-recent rap album, Prime Time.)

The SNL appearance is the latest high-profile stop on Chalamet’s press tour and awards campaign for A Complete Unknown. The actor has spent the last month promoting his work in James Mangold’s film – including a headline-making appearance on ESPN’s College Gameday and a viral interview with Nardwuar. He sat with his Little Women and Lady Bird costar, Saoirse Ronan, for a conversation, much to the delight of social media users. Tom Cruise even came to bat for Chalamet, attending a screening of A Complete Unknown in London. (In a Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon-type fashion, Cruise has several ties to A Complete Unknown, having worked with Mangold on Knight and Day and co-stars Monica Barbaro and Elle Fanning on Top Gun: Maverick and The War of the Worlds, respectively.) Chalamet is widely predicted to land his second-ever Best Actor Oscar nomination for A Complete Unknown, sitting third in the odds just behind second-place contender Ralph Fiennes (Conclave). Adrien Brody remains in first place in the Best Actor race.

But Chalamet is coming on quite strongly. For playing Dylan in the film, the actor, 29, has already received Best Actor nominations from the Golden Globes, Critics Choice Awards, and Screen Actors Guild Awards. It’s expected Chalamet will also land a Best Actor nomination from the BAFTA Awards next week and close the circuit with that aforementioned Oscar bid soon after. Better still for his potential to jump ahead of Brody in Phase 2 is A Complete Unknown itself. The Searchlight Pictures release – which has topped $40 million at the box office since opening on Christmas Day – has quickly become one of the standout titles for the industry in awards season. Chalamet received one of three individual SAG Awards nominations for the film, joining supporting actor Edward Norton and supporting actress nominee Barbaro. A Complete Unknown also landed an ensemble nomination. Mangold, who has never received Best Director recognition from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences, also secured his own recognition through a nomination from the Directors Guild. The veteran filmmaker was a surprise nominee, cracking the field ahead of expected contenders such as Denis Villeneuve (Dune: Part Two), Jon M. Chu (Wicked), Coralie Fargeat (The Substance), and Ridley Scott (Gladiator II). (The other DGA Awards nominees – Jacques Audiard, Sean Baker, Edward Berger, and Brady Corbet were predicted to receive bids from the group.) A Complete Unknown has also found favor with some of the other crafts guilds, including for its sound and production design. The film also received 11 BAFTA longlist mentions, tying it with The Brutalist and The Substance in third place behind BAFTA longlist pace-setters Emilia Perez (15 bids) and Conclave (14 mentions). 

This puts A Complete Unknown in a position to overperform with Oscar voters this year. If that plays out as expected, and either The Brutalist or Conclave stumbles in a similar fashion to how each film performed with SAG Awards voters – Brody was a lone nominee for The Brutalist, while his costars Guy Pearce and Felicity Jones were snubbed; Fiennes and the ensemble cast made it in for Conclave, but Isabella Rossellini was left off the supporting actress ballot – Chalamet might be well-positioned to strike. (In a twist, if Chalamet does win Best Actor later this year, he’d break the record set by Brody in 2003 to become the youngest winner in the category’s history.)

Chalamet’s SNL episode is scheduled for the eve of the Critics Choice Awards, which were shifted back two weeks due to the deadly California wildfires (the ceremony was originally slated for Sunday). Assuming he’s nominated, Oscar voters will have the chance to cast a winner ballot for the actor beginning on Tuesday, Feb. 11.

In addition to Chalamet, NBC also revealed Dave Chappelle will return to Studio 8H to host SNL on Jan. 18. It will be Chappelle’s fourth time as a solo host. Chalamet is making his third solo appearance.