“Marty Supreme” wowed the New York Film Festival last month when it surprise-screened on a Monday night, with star Timothée Chalamet and director Josh Safdie in attendance. Social media reactions were all raves for Chalamet’s performance as a prodigy ping-pong player who, in the 1950s, goes to hell and back in pursuit of greatness — wrecking lives, and cars, and apartments along the way.
The film is Josh Safdie’s first outing as a solo feature director after he and Benny confirmed in early 2024 that they’d be working separately on other projects post-“Uncut Gems” and “Good Time.” Behold “Marty Supreme,” the second Safdie movie from A24 to come out this fall after Benny’s “The Smashing Machine.” Chalamet has Best Actor Oscar buzz for playing an ambitious-to-a-fault ping pong player.
The rest of the ensemble includes Tyler the Creator, Odessa A’zion, Kevin O’Leary, Fran Drescher, Abel Ferrara, and Gwyneth Paltrow in her first onscreen feature film role since “Avengers: Endgame.” She plays a fading stage actress who gets a plum role, but then falls for Marty’s guiles.
“Uncut Gems” cinematographer Darius Khondji joins Josh Safdie for “Marty Supreme,” with Daniel Lopatin aka Oneohtrix Point Never providing the score as per previous Safdie films. While the film appears to be based on a true story, Marty Mauser (that’s Chalamet’s character) is not a real person but is inspired by myriad sports figures and Lower East Siders in Manhattan from the mid-20th century. Reportedly, “Marty Supreme” is now A24’s most expensive in-house production, with Safdie’s film demanding a thorough and immersive recreation of Lower Manhattan in the 1950s.
Chalamet trained in ping-pong for years in anticipation of the role. “Everything I was working on, it was this secret: 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,” he told The Hollywood Reporter.
Watch the trailer for “Marty Supreme” below.