Timothy Chalamet

Timothée Hal Chalamet was born on December 27, 1995, in New York City, and grew up in the federally subsidized artists' building Manhattan Plaza in Hell's Kitchen. He has an elder sister, Pauline Chalamet, who is an actress. His mother, Nicole Flender, is a third-generation New Yorker, of half Russian Jewish and half Austrian Jewish descent. She is a real estate agent at The Corcoran Group, and a former Broadway dancer; Flender earned her bachelor's degree in French from Yale University, and has been a French teacher and dance teacher. His French father, Marc Chalamet, is an editor for the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) and former New York correspondent for Le Parisien. Marc is from Nîmes and is of Protestant background. Timothée's paternal grandmother, who had moved to France, was originally Canadian. On his mother's side, he is a nephew of husband-and-wife filmmakers and producers Rodman Flender and Amy Lippman.

Chalamet is bilingual in English and French, and holds dual United States and French citizenship due to his French father. Growing up, Chalamet spent summers in Le Chambon-sur-Lignon, a small French village two hours away from Lyon, at the home of his paternal grandparents. He stated that his time in France led to cross-cultural identity issues. Chalamet attended PS 87 William T. Sherman School for elementary school, and later the selective Delta program at MS 54 Booker T. Washington Middle School, which he described as miserable due to the lack of a creative outlet within the school's academically rigorous environment.

Heath Ledger's performance as the Joker in The Dark Knight (2008) inspired Chalamet to pursue a career in acting. He applied to Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts. His acceptance into the school was a turning point in his appreciation for acting. His sophomore-year drama teacher at LaGuardia was so impressed by his audition that he insisted on Chalamet's acceptance into the school, even though he had been rejected in the interview (due to his middle school record), saying: "I gave him the highest score I've ever given a kid auditioning." During high school, Chalamet dated Madonna's daughter Lola Leon, a fellow student, for a year. He starred in school musicals as Emcee in Cabaret and Oscar Lindquist in Sweet Charity, graduating in 2013. Chalamet is also a YoungArts alumnus.

After high school, Chalamet, then 17, attended Columbia University for a year, majoring in cultural anthropology, and was a resident of Hartley Hall. He later transferred to New York University's Gallatin School of Individualized Study to pursue his acting career more freely, having found it difficult to assimilate to Columbia directly after filming Interstellar. Upon leaving Columbia, Chalamet moved to Concourse, Bronx.