Timothée Chalamet Plays a Table Tennis Pro in 'Marty Supreme' With Real-Life Ping-Pong Skills

When an actor takes on a role where they have to play an expert in something, it's easy for filmmakers to use a bit of that movie magic and bring in a body double, or someone to sing for them with the actor simply lip syncing along the way. For Timothée Chalamet and his role in Marty Supreme, though, fans noted how legitimate his table tennis skills appear to be.

So, did Timothée Chalamet learn table tennis, or ping-pong, for those not in the biz, before he began filming the Josh Safdie film? Marty Supreme is the story of hustling table tennis prodigy Marty Mauser, which was inspired by real-life 1950s table tennis player Marty Reisman. Timothée plays the title character, but how deep did his devotion to the role go once he was cast?

Well before Marty Supreme premiered in December 2025, and before it even began filming, Timothée was knee-deep in the world of table tennis. In fact, he trained for literal years to be able to be camera-ready and take on the role of Marty in the film.

Timothée took a table with him when he traveled for different movies like Wonka and Dune, both of which came out well before Marty Supreme. In doing so, Timothée learned how to play table tennis so he could portray his character properly. He told The Hollywood Reporter that he began training in 2018.

"Everything I was working on, it was this secret," he told the outlet. "I had a table in London while I was making Wonka. On Dune 2, I had a table in Budapest, Jordan. I had a table in Abu Dhabi. I had a table at the Cannes Film Festival for The French Dispatch. I got myself an Airbnb in a town [around] Saint-Tropez after The French Dispatch, overlooking the water, and I was taking lessons there."

Timothée began learning how to play table tennis and training for the role even before there was confirmation of Marty Supreme happening. But, in order to even potentially play the lead character in the film, he trained for years to bring the character to life on the big screen. Though he had played before casually, Timothée told Good Morning America's George Stephanopoulos, per ABC News, that trainers helped get him to a level where he could make it look good on film.

The heart of Marty Supreme is table tennis. Since Timothée learned how to play and then trained with Diego Schaaf, the table tennis consultant used for the movie, he didn't need a body double to make the table tennis scenes look legitimate. Per the Los Angeles Times, Timothée declined a body double and opted for choreographed moves as needed for some of the more intricate table tennis scenes in Marty Supreme.