Chalamets Quirky Shoot Sparks Oscar Date Speculation

 has posed for one of his quirkiest photo shoots yet.

The Oscar-nominated actor pretended to be an entirely new character, a New Yorker named Shend, for the new issue of W magazine.

His Marty Supreme director Josh Safdie was the 'director' behind this oddball character.

In one image, the artist was seen holding a giant dark gray rabbit while in a blue tracksuit. 

Shend is as out-there as they come: he is a '30-something dreamer-schemer who still lives with his mother, makes pimped-out controllers he hawks from the trunk of his car, is a champion Yu-Gi-Oh! card player,' as he works as a doorman, the magazine explained..

'Shend is a very New York guy,' the 30‑year‑old actor added, 'but a more contemporary version of an outsider.' 

Meanwhile, his fans have taken to X to wonder if he will take girlfriend Kylie Jenner to the Academy Awards on March 15. 

'Is he gonna bring Kylie or what? If not, I am tuning out,' wrote one fan while another said, 'He needs to lean on Ky, she is a Leo and he needs her strength at the Oscars.'

Jenner was last seen with Chalamet at the EE BAFTA Film Awards 2026 at The Royal Festival Hall in London on February 22.

Chalamet has earned three Academy Award nominations for Best Actor, making him the youngest male actor in history to . 

His nominations are for Call Me by Your Name (2018), A Complete Unknown (2025), and Marty Supreme (2026).

His competition this year is Leonardo DiCaprio for One Battle After Another, Ethan Hawke for Blue Moon, Michael B. Jordan for Sinners and Wagner Moura for The Secret Agent

Next Chalamet will be seen in Dune 3.

He has admitted he approached the final chapter of the sci‑fi saga with a level of intensity he hadn't tapped into before.

The star explained that he felt a deep responsibility to honour his final performance as Paul Atreides. For him, the third film wasn't just another sequel, it was a culmination.

Speaking at Variety and CNN's event at the University of Texas at Austin this month, he said: 'I didn't want to be complacent about a single moment. Everything was sacred, and it was my last time doing a Dune film, so I really wanted to treat it as sacred. Because people can get complacent, but I was more intense on the third one. It felt like that was the natural momentum, so I wanted to push against that as hard as I could.'

The star, who has led the franchise since Denis Villeneuve's 2021 adaptation of Frank Herbert's classic novel, explained that returning to familiar sequences didn't make the experience easier. In fact, it made him more determined to elevate his performance.

He shared: 'On the first Dune, we had an ornithopter sequence that I got a chance to do again in the third, but this time I was way more geared up.

'On Dune 3, as opposed to the first movie, I came out early and studied the control panel — all sorts of hieroglyphics and things that aren't tethered to reality. I wanted to know what each button did, and invent a dynamic for myself with it.'

Meanwhile, Chalamet recently slammed a 'punk' co-star for questioning his acting ability.

The Homeland actor's skills were dismissed by an unnamed star in an ensemble piece because of his level of formal training.

The Little Women standout - who has won one Golden Globe, one Actor Awards and two Critics Choice awards - told Matthew McConaughey in conversation for Variety: 'No names, but the guy was a punk.

'He asked me what conservatory I had gone to, and I said I didn't go to an acting conservatory. And he said, "Well, you haven't trained as an actor then." And we were all part of an ensemble.'

Chalamet has grown used to being offered unsolicited advice but clarified that McConaughey, who he appeared with in 2014's Interstellar, hadn't been like that with him.

He said: 'I always said, "Beware of the people in life that get more of the advice they give you than you get at the advice."

'They're thrilled by the act of giving you advice. All of a sudden you can't listen to what they're saying anymore because they're flexing on you so hard. You never did that to me, though, which I'm grateful for.'