The colour of Timothee Chalamet's suit for this year's Oscars is certainly unconventional. Photo: AP
If you wish to fully grasp Timothee Chalamet’s Oscars suit, you may do better to consult a food reporter rather than a fashion critic.
They might be able to tell you the outfit was a shade of French butter. Or was it egg yolk? Perhaps just lemon?
Whatever the tint of his monochrome look, Chalamet’s effervescent not-a-tux was the consensus gotta-talk-about-it outfit of the evening.
There was certainly much to scrutinise.
The jacket was cropped like a maitre d’s uniform.
A tie? Overlooked. In its place, a dot of a pearl collar. The pants, which weren’t even suit pants but were, in fact, shaped like five pocket jeans, puddled indifferently around his glossed black boots.
It’s unclear if this outfit was nodding to an outfit Bob Dylan once wore, as some of Chalamet’s carpet looks have during this award’s season sprint, but his Oscars look at least had the spirit of Dylan (this critic’s theory: It was Blonde On Blonde in outfit form).
This was a suit that smirked at ceremony but felt glamorous and elevated despite its provocation.
The unusual red carpet outfit also provided a crucial preview for Givenchy, which made it specially for Chalamet.
The Academy Awards came a day before Paris Fashion Week commences, a week that will include the first runway show from Givenchy’s recently appointed creative director, Sarah Burton.
Alongside an Audrey Hepburn-ish black-bowed gown worn by Elle Fanning, Chalamet’s Tweety Bird combo served as the amuse-bouche for whatever Burton is going to present days from now.
Read more: 2025 Oscars fashion: Michelle Yeoh in striking blue, Blackpink's Lisa suits up
To note: Chalamet is the men’s fashion industry’s teaser of choice. In January he made noise at the Golden Globes in a sequin-speckled suit, the first design from Tom Ford’s new creative director, Haider Ackermann.
Most actors continue to view the Oscars as solemn ground and dress for it.
Adrien Brody, Joe Alwyn, Sebastian Stan and Ralph Fiennes reflected the overwhelming majority in aspirational, if expected, black tuxedos.
Even The Apprentice nominee Jeremy Strong, the industry’s leading lobbyist for brown as an acceptable formalwear colour, wore a cappuccino Loro Piana tux that fit, well, as straight and to-the-body as a tuxedo should.
What brands like Givenchy seized on is that flouting conventions on the carpet can make for great publicity, even if it doesn’t always make for praise.
Valentino deployed this tactic as well. The label is in the midst of a complete overhaul under the creative direction of Alessandro Michele, who joined Valentino last March after nearly eight years at Gucci.
Colman Domingo wear a fiery red tux for the event. Photo: The New York Times
And what Sunday proved is that Michele’s aesthetic (think: Victorian grandpa after a few too many glasses of psychedelic-spiked sherry) may work better on the red carpet than the runway.
Take Colman Domingo’s Valentino suit jacket in a red even more potent than the carpet at his feet.
Worn with some disco-y flares, the jacket was belted at the waist, like a kimono.
Oh, it was rococo all right. But it also granted Domingo, who was nominated for best actor, a louche ease.
Or, Omar Apollo, an actor from Queer, who wore a black Valentino suit with beefy lapels and a bouffant scarf streaming down the front in lieu of a tie.
Another actor from Queer, Drew Starkey, wore a similar scarf-as-tie Valentino outfit at the Screen Actors Guild Awards. Evidently, Michele doesn’t see menswear’s halting tie revival as revolutionary enough.
Read more: From the fashion archives: Vintage designs stand out at red carpet events
There was, though, one more actor who swerved harder than them all: Adam Sandler.
During the show’s opening monologue, just after Conan O’Brien declared that “for such a prestigious night it’s important that everyone’s properly dressed”, the camera whipped to Sandler, dressed in mesh shorts and a hoodie, as if suiting up for pickup basketball.
It was a bit, sure. But it was the sort of outfit that has long made Sandler, 58, Hollywood’s version of John Fetterman.
It was played for laughs, but it got at an earnest idea: Sandler’s passion for mesh is distinctively his own and can be capitalised on.
“You know what, Conan, I like the way I look because I’m a good person,” Sandler lobbed back toward the stage.
“I don’t care about what I wear and what I don’t wear.”
You know who does care though? Aviator Nation, the brand that made Sandler’s hoodie.
Moments after he appeared on the broadcast, the company sent out an email blast that the neon blue zip-up was available on its website for US$175 (approximately RM782).
How rare is that? An Oscars outfit, at a budget price. – ©2025 The New York Times Company
