The ever-lovable Timothée Chalamet may have caught your eye in his other blockbusters—hi, Dune—but let us not forget that the curly-haired cutie will be transforming into the Candy Man (no, not the scary one) and coming to a movie theatre near you. ICYMI, Timmy is the latest actor to embody the classic character Willy Wonka, and yeah, he has some giant shoes to fill. Timothée will star in the upcoming prequel film to the iconic Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. The movie, titled Wonka, is Willy Wonka’s origin story and will hit theaters on December 15, 2023.
To tide you over til then, here’s everything we know so far about Wonka.
Wonka trailers are here and they’re a lil bonkers
The movie kicked off promo with a trailer on July 11 featuring Hugh Grant as a captured Oompa Loompa? It’s a whole thing, clearly:
And in the time since, we’ve been #blessed with another trailer that you’ve gotta check out:
Timothée dropped a sneak peek of himself in costume
Look! At! The! Material! Granted, many People of the Internet compared him to the muppet playing Charles Dickens (lol), but hey, you can’t please everyone.
“The suspense is terrible, I hope it will last…🏭WONKA🍫,” Timothée wrote in the caption.
Wonka is Willy Wonka’s origin story
Wonka is based on characters created by Roald Dahl, and the story focuses on a young Wonka and his adventures prior to opening his famous chocolate factory. Paul King will direct the film based on Simon Farnaby’s screenplay. David Heyman and Luke Kelly will produce the movie, and Michael Siegel and Alexandra Derbyshire will serve as executive producers.
In an interview with Time, Timothée said the story isn’t “mining the darker emotions in life” but is “a celebration of being off-center and of being okay with the weirder parts of you that don’t quite fit in.”
In an interview with Collider in 2018, Wonka producer Heyman spoke about the creation of the prequel: “It’s a prequel; it’s not a sequel. What makes Willy—when we find him at the chocolate factory doing the golden ticket, where is he before that? What leads him to that place where he’s locked himself away? It’s ‘How does he get there?’ So we’re playing around with that.”
Wonka will be the third telling of Willy Wonka, following the 1971 adaptation of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory starring Gene Wilder and the 2005 remake with Johnny Depp in the role.
Timothée’s mom is a fan 👀
Yep, the actor recently revealed to People that Wonka might just be his mother Nicole Flender’s favorite movie he’s ever done. “This is maybe her favorite thing I’ve ever been in,” he told the outlet before adding, “I think she saw Bones and All and said, ‘You gotta be happier in your movies!’”
The celeb then further elaborated on his sentiment: “But this is the tradition. I come from a musical theater family, and this is more in line of the kind of movie I would’ve thought I’d be doing 10 years ago, if I was lucky enough to work at all.”
“This was so fun to work on. This was unlike anything I’ve ever worked on, I think,” he concluded. Be still my heart!
There will be singing *and* dancing
Ohhh, yes. This is what we like to hear. “I felt out of my league,” Timothée told Time after finishing a bit of music recording for the iconic role. “Like I was desecrating history!” He was obvs the top choice and they ~finally~ cast him after resolving scheduling issues.
You’ve got some big shoes to fill, Timmy. We’re sure you can pull it off.
Paulina Jayne Isaac is a Philadelphia-based freelance writer and editor, who covers politics, culture, and lifestyle (especially when they intersect with race, gender, or mental health). Her work can be found in Glamour, Bustle, The Cut, Well+Good, Stylecaster, and other outlets. When not writing, she can be found listening to Taylor Swift, watching a teen drama (One Tree Hill is her favorite), or perfecting her skin-care routine. You can follow Paulina on Instagram @paulinajayne15.
Lifestyle Editor
Christen A. Johnson is the lifestyle editor at Cosmopolitan where she covers health and wellness, money, career, home, pets, food, travel and more for print and digital. A true lifestyle generalist, Christen spends her day writing about the best throw pillows and champagne glasses one minute, to editing stories about yeast infections, toxic family members, and ethical pet products the next. Christen was previously on Cosmo’s culture team, where she covered celebrity and entertainment news, awards shows, and interviewed some of your faves, like Megan thee Stallion and Queen Latifah. She wrote Cosmo’s first-ever digital cover story featuring Chlöe Bailey. Before joining the magazine, Christen spent the first four years of her career at the Chicago Tribune, starting out as a life and culture editorial assistant on the lifestyle, entertainment, and food & dining teams. Her last position at the newspaper was a features reporter for the Living section, where she specialized in health, pets, home, design, style, and relationship content. Several of her health and style stories made the legacy paper’s front page. When Christen isn’t digging through antique stores, she’s likely drooling over home renos on HGTV, asking her friends and family about their feelings, sharing her latest therapy revelation, redoing old workouts from her college basketball days, or trying to perfect her homemade buttermilk biscuit recipe. Follow her on Insta for BTS ~ editor life ~ tingz!
